Game of Cooks
by Sunruner
Summary: IN THE GAME OF COOKING YOU EITHER WIN OR YOU... DON'T WIN. But Lovino is used to not winning in anything except love, which he has in abundance, so why not give it a shot? With a small fortune on the line for his growing family and bigger dreams, all his boyfriend thinks he needs is a push in the right direction. Will it work? Prumano with a side of Het!GerIta. Food Network parody.
1. Preliminaries

**We Are Young.**

**AU Developed with Miquel Romani's help and support! We've been RPing parts of it but I found those scenes hard to repackage for a fanfic (flip-flopping POVs are tricky…), so I scooted around them instead.**

**Kitchen and Wilson are to blame for the title :D**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

Preliminaries

The intro is flashy and the music is a bit too dramatic, but it's the kind of prime-time entertainment formula most people expect and are familiar with. Stainless steel knives are animated and flash across the screen, hacking up vegetables and navigating frothing pots and gouts of kitchen flame. The title "_Game of Cooks"_ crashes into place with sparks and steam everywhere. The second season's opening is trying to show how high-octane the next ninety minutes are going to be, with marginal success.

Families are settling down to a bit of evening entertainment as the heavy voice of the narrator goes over the same endorsement and sponsor information from last season, with one or two additions to the roster. Then they go on to talk about the prizes. For the winner of this sixteen-week cook-off, there is a five-thousand dollar package of professional cookware, a one-hundred-and-fifty thousand dollar cash prize, and at least one endorsement deal with a popular home and food magazine. This is repeated three times while the screen changes and flashes to a towering high-rise in a generic American metropolis: it doesn't look like New York, and it doesn't give off the same vibe as Miami or Seattle, and it's not in middle America either. So is it Los Angeles or San Francisco?

Doesn't matter.

About ten minutes and a lot more camera-angles later to show the massive industrial kitchen at their disposal, the contestants are introduced. There are thirty of them, so most viewers aren't invested enough to start rooting for anyone off the bat, least of all the awkward Italian that comes through in the 12th slot.

"_My name is Lovino Vargas, and I am the Executive Chef for the Empress Hotel in Chicago." _He's Italian, so there's an automatic interest in households which share those roots- at least until the next Italian in the 18th spot starts talking, but let's ignore that for now. He's young, and with his olive skin, full lips, straight nose and strong chin, he catches a few female eyes and subtle laughs are exchanged from couches and recliners. _"Uh, I guess I started in my Nonna's kitchen when I was little, but after graduating from culinary school I spent two years training in Southern and Central Italy, and then spent several months in Spain before coming back home to start my career."_

While his voice-over continues the screen is showing a montage of the man in question cooking and serving various kinds of food in a white chef's uniform. They notice he doesn't smile very much, but his dark hands whip the knife across the cutting board cutting various fancy plants, and something about a man with that kind of control and a familiar grip on a flaming pan makes him very appealing- the sudden intrusion of a Spanish mandolin in the background also helps.

"_Does it really matter? I'm the oldest of three boys, the middle one is married, and I want to win because I don't like wasting my time."_ His brother his married, _he_ is not, so plus five points for the hot Italian.

Number 13 comes up and only a fraction of the entertained audience will remember that 12's name started with an L. But there's one platinum blonde sitting in his too-quiet apartment with a pissed off cat and an oblivious canary that just can't wait to watch the rest of tonight's episode. He's far from the only person in 12's close circle of friends who knows there was supposed to be a shout-out of "_It's your fucking fault I'm doing this!"_, but he can't help but pick up the threadbare red pillow off the arm-rest next to him and hug it close to his chest.

It's a poor substitute, but Gilbert's sure the next several weeks will be worth it.

While he's up to his elbows in a set of Norwegian ingredients he's never fucking heard of, Lovino is not so sure.

* * *

That shout-out is one Lovino didn't put much stock in getting through, because the crew in the booth filming him wanted something more along the lines of a catch-phrase or a "fuck yeah! cook all the things!" which he is just not interested in doing. He has one-hundred-fifty-thousand-and-one reasons why he's doing this, and the last one is called Gilbert: that fucking asshole with his fucking stupid ability to get Lovino to agree to really stupid shit.

They took away his phone, they made him sign a shit-load of paper-work, they gave him a hotel key and told him where all the cameras are so he doesn't accidentally walk naked in front of the crew. It's a reality show and Lovino has never felt more fucking self-conscious in his entire god-damned life, not even that time when he was in high-school and there was way too much fuss about getting him a date for prom.

To make matters worse: it was hard enough coming out to his family a few years ago. He's absolutely not going to do it in a pent-house full of strangers on national television with his boyfriend watching.

His only saving grace is as follows: the competition actually gives two shits about the food they produce and serve. He had no idea how to prepare the salty pickled _whatever the fucking hell that was_ for the judges, but boiling the shit out of it and then battering and frying what was left actually didn't taste like vomit. Two other chefs used the deep-fryer like he did, but one burnt his and the other hadn't thought to get her fingers in it properly to realize there was sand in there.

Sand girl and that's-not-how-you-make-sushi guy were the bottom two, they had to clean the kitchen while Lovino and twenty-seven other chefs got to return to the hotel and sleep off jet-lag. He's sharing his bedroom with two other men, which would be awkward if they were fifteen but it's just an inconvenience at twenty-eight. There's one camera in the bedroom and none in the bathroom, and as one of his room-mates brushes his teeth and the other is out boasting about how great he is at everything, Lovino blindly searches for his notebook and tears a page out of it.

He writes "I hope the cat pukes in your shoe" with a thick marker, leaves it where the camera can see, and crawls under the covers while wearing one of Gilbert's unwashed sweaters.

* * *

How does one get Lovino Vargas to enter a celebrity cooking contest like _Game of Cooks_? By getting his family on-board.

And how does one convince the Vargas clan to bully their eldest son into actually getting involved? By reminding them what kind of sonofabitch he works for at the Empress Hotel.

There isn't one single, concise, stand-alone word in the English language that sums up Gilbert's feelings for one Roderich Edelstein. There are a couple in German, but those can't be re-printed in several states, and their English equivalents are similarly vulgar. Gilbert doesn't care that he's biased either because the only person whose hatred comes close to his belongs to Lovino's grandma.

Nonna Vargas is the picture of the Italian grandmother: sweet, kind, mothering, often very quiet, and usually cooking something delicious. She smells like baking and candies. She wears a head-scarf for God's sake, and she was the first member of the family to actually use Gilbert's name after he and her grandson got together two years ago. Gilbert had been convinced for the better part of those two years that Nonna Vargas had spent any temper she possibly had raising her son- Lovino's father, and was pretty sure the family was lying to him about Lovino inheriting her violent nature.

But then Edelstein fucked with her grandbaby's birthday.

Nobody fucks with Nonna's birthday dinners. Fucking nobody. But Lovino's boss called him when they all knew he'd booked the day off almost a month in advance, and he did it right when they were just sitting down to a braised lamb dish that took _three days _for Nonna to prepare_. _It was come in and run a service for some hoity-toity guest Lovino had already prepared his staff for, or lose his job on the spot because of that blood-sucking contract he'd signed with the hotel.

So Lovino kissed his Nonna and left, and Gilbert didn't understand why Grandpa Vargas decided to go hide in his hobby room while Feliciano started sweating and asking his wife if she wanted to go out for a walk. Monica and Gilbert are cousins, and she'd already been five months pregnant at the time, so for once she'd said no and they'd both been very confused by this very strange family.

In total Nonna Vargas broke four plates and called on six different saints to strike down the monster who'd taken her grandbaby away from her on his birthday. Gilbert and Monica also learned that Lovino picked up most of his swears from the kindly old sweet-heart, not the more verbose and wine-loving grandfather who usually takes the blame for his vocabulary. If there had been a weapon in the house Gilbert doesn't doubt that the old woman could have whipped a shot-gun around and blasted through a couple walls until her rage was spent, because it was like watching a much older, female Lovino blow his top.

So a month and a few more emotional work-related fits later, Gilbert and his boyfriend were reclining on their couch together, in their apartment, watching re-runs of last season's cook-off competition. In between Lovino laughing at the screen watching some idiot mutilate a chicken, and screaming in professional agony as someone else's hand slipped and shattered a bottle of truffle oil, the blonde broached the subject of getting him on one of those shows.

He was shot down so fast he actually had to check for a bullet wound, but it didn't turn into an argument. If Lovino actually liked his job then they might have started shouting at each other, but he really fucking does not, and Gilbert hates watching him get stomped on and harassed at work. Lovino deserves his own god-damned kitchen, with his name on the menu and his stamp on every meal. And no, their apartment kitchen isn't what he's talking about.

When you throw in the fact that Lovino didn't flip out when the re-run ended with a commercial advertising the talent search for the second season, including its Chicago locations, it meant he was thinking about it. One quick call from Gilbert to Nonna explaining the idea led to the entire god-damned _tribe_ showing up outside their apartment, hog-tying Lovino to a chair, and Gilbert wasn't there so he doesn't actually know what kind of satanic ritual they performed on him. He just knows Lovino pulled out his good knife set and spent the next week massacring every organic item in their fridge to make sure his skills hadn't suffered after three years cooking the hotel's stuffy menu.

He also told Gilbert it would be his damned fault if Lovino humiliated himself on national television. Gilbert replied with an ultimatum: either he opens his own restaurant in the next twelve months, or Gilbert punches out Roderich Edelstein and spends a couple nights in prison for assault.

They shook on it, and after that it was all line-ups, recipe submissions, two interviews, and one weird photo-test with a photographer who seemed way too attached to Lovino's neck and shoulders for Gilbert's peace of mind.

He doesn't care if the cat pukes in his shoes, Gilbert just wants his boyfriend to be the last chef standing.

* * *

**I actually really like Austria, but the words got away from me and he's already hard to work for in the canon. Monica seems to be the most popular name for Fem!Germany.**

**I also really love cooking competitions like these. Hell's Kitchen, Chopped, and Top Chef are all guilty pleasures of mine, so why the heck not do a parody fic? Drop a comment below!**

**I'll see you guys with chapter 2!**


	2. Mid Point

**Hall of Fame,**

**Anyone who, like me, watches these shows knows there's usually nothing interesting in the first half of the season because there are like twenty-something people to keep track of. You're lucky if you remember someone's name, nevermind what kind of cook they are, SO LETS SKIP IT.**

**I was going to post this on Wednesday, but then I told someone I would update today, and it's September 11th and you know what? Some people need to smile.**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

Mid-Point

"_I honestly can't wait for Lovino to fall flat on his face in the kitchen. And I mean that: when it happens, I'm gonna laugh."_

"_So he works in, like, the biggest hotel in Chicago. You know what? It's Chicago, fuck him: West-Coast represent!"_

"_I have no idea what's up with him. The guy can prep a rack of lamb in under ten minutes, but he fucked up a potato salad."_

* * *

Some competitions film every single day for a month, keeping contestants in the heat of things and inconveniencing their real lives as little as possible. Each day or two then becomes an episod, or a special. Lovino knows this because in the few weeks it took to get him on the roster for this show, he looked into how the industry works before signing his life away for three months.

But this competition is sponsored by a bunch of dicks who read the Hunger Games to their kids and thought it was a great idea. Their episodes aren't broadcast live, but there's only a 72 hour delay between events as they happen and when they're broadcast: this is in their contract. Events on Tuesday's episode are a combination of everything that happened on Friday and the weekend. Thursday is elimination night, so that recaps Tuesday's drama plus whatever happens in the middle of the week.

Contestants are kept busy with bizarre challenges like forming an entre out of whey protein powder, or being flown back and forth across the country every two weeks for special jet-lag arcs. Menu planning and skill practice take up the rest of their time, and they're slowly developing an entire language out of how and when they sharpen knives versus what kind of dishes are sitting in the kitchen sink. Their lives are turning into a prison drama orbiting around a theme of collapsed cakes and salt in the sugar bowl.

He can't tell if it's a good or bad thing that they can't watch the show themselves when it airs, but the channel is blocked on the suite television. They don't get to hear what each person says about the others when they go into that tiny closet and gush to the little spy-cam mounted on the wall. Lovino was freaked out by that room for the first two weeks of the competition, and now they're creeping up on week six and he's actually getting hives from it. It's like confession except a hundred times worse, because it's not confession and it's being fed into the crew's editing box before being clipped and montaged and set to music for the whole fucking nation to watch.

He wants his phone back. He wants an internet connection. He wants something other than the morning paper which isn't gonna tell him any of the shit he wants to hear. He doesn't care about gas prices or politicians or the weather, he wants to hear his boyfriend's god-damned voice again and ask his brother how his German wife is doing. If Lovino's stuck in California when that baby comes, he's going to lose his shit and take most of the remaining contestants out with him.

Lovino's heard the story at least a thousand times, but he still doesn't understand how his little brother, a school teacher, not only met an army girl like Monica Beilschmidt, but woo'd her, married her, and got her pregnant. It doesn't make any fucking sense to him, but at least he doesn't have to worry about his brother's safety ever again. Monica's nice when she smiles, and she's cute and awkward dealing with anything that doesn't come with instructions, like his brother, but the woman also knows how to kill a man with only a grape and his own moustache. She's a tank in human form, and it's fucking scary.

He's going to be an uncle and Gilbert is going to be a second-cousin to his cousin's baby, but the bastard was supposed to keep him updated and now he fucking can't. When Lovino slips into that closet and sits down, he wants to spill his guts about all of this because it's so quiet and completely personal inside. But he doesn't, because that red recording eye of Satan reminds him that there are at least ten people on the other side of the cable, and millions beyond them if his confession is dramatic enough to make it past the editors.

So he just opens his note-book, and he knows he didn't put much effort into scribbling out the "I miss you" in the corner, but written underneath is a sincere wish: "I hope you choke on a grape."

* * *

A month and a half without Lovino is starting to drive Gilbert completely crazy, and it's showing at work. He's barely sleeping because the bed doesn't smell like his Italian anymore, and he's not eating because fuck him he's never been any good at cooking. Instead of the roasted lamb and seared veggies his boyfriend can put out in only twenty minutes, he's been eating sandwiches and microwaved meals because he's already gone through most of the things Lovino made and froze for him before leaving. He's boiled up some of the home-made and dried pasta his boyfriend whips up in huge batches every few weeks, but it doesn't matter how closely he follows the recipe to dress it in garlic, oil, cracked pepper and sea-salt, it never tastes the way it should.

When the love-sickness gets to him at work though, that's a really big warning sign. Gilbert is a foreman for his family's demolition and construction company: a head contractor who has his own team of surveyors and architects and a phone full of labour contacts who can plaster, paint, plumb and wire anything with a basic structure. All of this means that he usually leaves home early and sometimes stays out later than he should trying to meet deadlines.

Pulling a fender-bender on the way to work is not fucking okay. Getting into the accident because the radio played a commercial with his boyfriend's voice muffled in the background makes it worse.

There aren't too many differences between Gilbert at home and Gilbert at work. He's a rough kind of guy, he likes beer and fights and sports, he gets excited around big machines and demolition is the best part of any contract he and his team take. Gilbert Beilschmidt punched out the first person to ever call him a "faggot" in public, and the last time someone decided to be "offended" over how he lives his life he turned around and kissed his boyfriend in the check-out line.

He takes pride in straightening crooked buildings and re-framing flimsy walls. He has a strong background in drafting and he's tried easing the loneliness of the last eight weeks with creating floor-plans and layouts for Lovino's restaurant. So even after he trades numbers with the driver he rear-ended in morning traffic, and they both check and there's no damage to either vehicle, everything is really, really wrong in his world.

He can't start the car. He can't figure out how to work his phone and tell his right-hand he's not going to be in on time, or at all. He can't even turn the radio off where it's still playing and zapping his battery. Gilbert Beilschmidt is not a woman trapped in a man's body, he's doesn't live vicariously or flaunt gender norms: he's a man in love with another man, and he misses him so fucking much it's making him sick inside. He's a physical guy who can't hold the thing he wants most right now, he can't even call him or write a letter. Even if it was his god-damn idea, and even if Lovino keeps kicking the crap out of his competitors on that show twice a week, he's not here with Gilbert, and that makes none of this okay.

When he finally gets his car going again, he has two options and chucks the one called "work" out the window. He's not too sure what the hell is waiting for him when he parks on the street in an older neighbourhood in the city, but he knows his cousin is at work because Monica refuses to take time off until the baby actually comes, and Feliciano is a school teacher and at work because it's a Thursday. So he knocks on Nonna Vargas' door, and he's so fucking thankful that it's the little Italian woman who answers it, not her taller and far more disapproving husband.

"I, uh…" Shit, he's not really sure why he thought this was a good idea. "S-Sorry…" He gets hit with a scowl from Lovino's mother-figure, but when the scent of something with tomatoes and basil gets up his nose, his stomach loudly requests entry.

"You look hungry." Umm… "Are you eating?"

"Uh, I had coffee, I just-"

"Coffee doesn't count, you've grown _skinny._" Eight weeks of peanut-butter and toast will do that to you… "Come sit down, you're wasting away."

"Thank you." Gilbert comes inside and the scent of cooking that smells like Lovino's cooking makes it hard to keep his eyes open. "I should have called, um…"

It's the same three-level town-house Lovino's dad was born and raised in, and the same place where the three brothers came to live after events they don't talk about meant they needed a safe home to come back to. The youngest brother is away at college a few states over, Feliciano and his wife live in a different neighbourhood, and Gilbert's partner is in California for another month and a half. He'll come home sooner if he loses, but that means he has to lose, and Gilbert doesn't want that.

It's kind of like how when he's invited into the house, he doesn't want to notice that the PVR system on Nonna Vargas' television has been paused. He doesn't want to see that notebook open in front of the camera in a quaint blue room that looks kind of like a closet, with a familiar chestnut head bowed down on one hand behind the book. But he notices it and he sees that image, and without his control his eyes read the scribbles on the page and his brain translates them into words, and his heart tells his stomach to shut up because lovesickness hurts a lot more than hunger.

Nonna tells him to sit down and brings him a heaping plate of pasta in a creamy bolognaise sauce. When Gilbert can't keep it together anymore because his heart hurts so bad, she makes him move to the living room instead so he can see his exhausted boyfriend hiding his face from the camera on screen.

She tells him Feliciano gets the same way whenever Monica goes away on army business, and he doesn't feel so bad about crying when she tells him the tears just mean he's part of the family.

* * *

After a gripping double elimination last week- _CRASH, BAM!_ –Tuesday's episode promises drama and a deep upset in the house' dynamics!

There are flashes of shocked faces and deep gasps, bursts of flame that lick one chef's unprotected face before another is shown gripping her hand in agony. The music is a ripping guitar, cymbals and thunder booming in time in the background! The network ratings are beginning to climb as the herd of competitors thins out, rivalries and chemistry taking up the air-ways as polls start appearing across the internet.

The foodies are chatting about who's got the edge going into the top ten, because the show was cruel in the beginning and only eight weeks in over half the competitors are already gone. With improved screen time for the eleven vying for that coveted place, personalities are emerging and fan-followings are forming.

The fan favourite is one Francis Bonnefoy, but he's so painfully French that it's hard to separate his real fans from the mock gathering. Raivis is popular with the younger viewers because of his innocent and honest looks, his homely cooking lacking finesse but extremely appealing on the plate. Lovino Vargas is the all-around favourite though, because with solid performances and a penchant for letting off real zingers in the kitchen, he provides that dash of unintentional humour while his antics in the house give fans more to talk about: like who's Jill?

The executives have spoken and, after reviewing the footage from the last half-week of competition, a montage is constructed using one unwilling chef's disjointed confessions in the booth.

"_Jill is the whole reason I'm here."_ His Illinois-meets-Italy accent makes the J sound like a G sometimes, but that's part of his charm. The screen shows night-camera footage, night after night of messages scrawled in black marker and held up in front of the bedroom camera. "_My family really got me to go along with this, but it was Jill's idea and I guess I'm glad I listened."_

Soft music starts playing, a piano solo:

I hope the cat pukes in your shoe.

I stole your sweater and I'm not giving it back.

Peanut butter is not the answer.

One clove garlic, two cracks pepper, three shakes salt, damn it.

It doesn't smell like you anymore…

"_My job is good, it pays really well and my staff is, uh, good."_ Viewers love irony, so extra footage from when they sent the camera crew to film "a day in the life of" their contestant shows restaurant staff from the Empress dropping plates and sitting down on the job wasting time. Lovino's face is stressed in one extended clip where he's being yelled at by a man in a suit from upstairs. _"Of course I want my own restaurant, who wouldn't? But I'll go back to the Empress. Jill doesn't like it but I'm lucky to make that kind of money."_

The montage comes to an end and it's just the contestant sitting in the private booth, the wall-mounted speaker activated but the voice of the interviewer edited out. The all-around contender is scratching the back of his head looking confused, his face starting to go red under the permanent olive tone of his skin.

"_Oh, no- uh, I don't carry pictures with me."_ They zoom in close on his face, watching him shuffle on the seat to pull out his wallet and fumble for something. _"But I've got this, and it's kind of important."_ It's the boarding pass the show sent to him, but on the backside is a bit of scribbled writing in blue pen. The camera can't focus on it because he keeps moving it back and forth, and then it vanishes back into his wallet and he slides it into his back pocket again. The viewers at home must feel cheated, but the higher-ups in the network love it.

And the only thing they love more is the TV magic that lets them use audio and video clips from almost three weeks ago, and stitch it together like it's happening right before the key events of tonight's episode.

Namely: Lovino Vargas' first major fuck-up of the competition, and the one that lands him squarely in eleventh place heading towards the elimination panel.

* * *

**Next update on Thursday, at which point I may have a job in Japan and chapter 5/6 ready to go :D**


	3. Bottom Two

**We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together, Hall of Fame.**

**My friends are going to burn me at the stake if I admit to listening to that first song for as long as I did to write this. :(**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

Bottom Two

"_AHAHAHA! FUCK YES!"_

"_I actually feel kinda bad for him right now."_

"_Welp, guess he's not really that Italian after all."_

* * *

The screen clips to Lovino with both hands up over his face, completely hiding his expression. He shakes his head and then bows down in his seat, head between his knees. Subtitles pop up on the screen as he chokes on an Italian phrase: _"Grandma, I'm so sorry."_

The hash-tag "Lovino Vargas" explodes.

* * *

"No! _No! No! No!"_ Gilbert is not taking it nearly as bad as Nonna Vargas, who has forgotten every word of English she ever learned and is crying her mother-tongue at the screen. The ninety minutes are almost up and it's dark outside the family dwelling. The show's logo and Lovino's defeated image both fade away as it cuts to commercial, and it's impossible right now to remember that what the family is watching actually happened several days ago, not live in front of them.

Pasta.

The ingredient was _pasta_.

His boyfriend had to serve pasta and he didn't even get _half_ his ingredients on the plate.

Lovino's Nonna gives the hysterical old woman equivalent of "I am so fucking done" as she bustles out of the living room to find something she can break. Grandpa Vargas goes after her and Feliciano looks wordlessly at his wife with his jaw hanging open like he's going to scream. He makes a sound that probably belongs to a small, starving dog, a signal that if Monica doesn't hug him as well as she can despite the baby bump sitting on her abdomen, he is going to cry. And by cry he means wail pathetically because his hero just completely failed to serve the first thing any Vargas learns how to make or eat.

Gilbert doesn't have anyone to turn around and hug, or to strangle for making such a stupid mistake. What he has is Lovino's face flashing by on the screen, more shitty editing cutting off whatever it is he's saying with those sharp, direct hand-gestures and the wild look in his eyes he only gets when he's really fucking mad. The reminder to tune in again on Thursday for the conclusion just convinces Gilbert that Nonna Vargas has the right idea: he might feel better if he breaks something.

* * *

This is exactly what the network wants: buzzwords, hash-tags, internet searches, it's glorious. There are twitter feeds, facebook pages, tumblr accounts, reddit rants, the works. It's interest and ratings and money, and they couldn't have asked for or constructed a better top-ten special if they'd tried.

The judges are just as conflicted as the viewers, which makes it all the better. It's a competition with a simple scoring system because complex rubrics confuse the average Joe. Taste, presentation, creativity: that's it. That's all they have to base their decisions on, but it's a panel of three plus a bonus judge for the challenge, and they can't make up their minds.

The judges are comparing boxed pasta to rotten vegetables, and they're using the ethics and professionalism of the culinary elite to hash out what to do. Do you give a professional sub-par ingredients and then penalize them for having the guts to reject them? Do you reward him on merit or slam him on technicalities?

The issue is story-board simple: a talented chef and early favourite refused to use the main ingredient, he made his own dough and conflicts with another chef in the kitchen prevented three of his major components from getting on the plate before time was up. The footage is conclusive and immediately uploaded to the show's Youtube account: not only did someone turn off Vargas' mixer when he left it to knead his dough, but the same chef took a bottle of cooking wine and hid it on a second contestant.

They don't have a rule for this, they didn't think they'd need one, and the executives aren't about to dictate how this wonderful drama is going to end. It's up to the judges: do they penalize the chef who failed to complete the challenge, or do the eliminate the roach hiding under the kitchen sink?

Oh.

Oh that's good.

They get ready to run that on Wednesday night's commercial slot: roaches are money in the bank.

* * *

He's not sure how much of everything ends up on what days of competition, but if his fuck-up goes public on a Tuesday, then it's the weirdest kind of time-warp knowing Tuesday is when he has to fix it.

He wants to punch someone. He wants to stick a sharpening steel through the throat of the fucker who messed with his station last night and turn this prison drama into an actual bloodbath. But there are ten other people in the pent-house, and nine of them are under suspicion.

He has no idea why, but Lovino isn't blaming the other person sitting in the bottom two with him. Bonnefoy fucks up next to never, neither of them have ever been less than fourth in any of the tests or challenges. When they're both summoned late on Tuesday night to go back in front of the judges, the Frenchman and the Italian have one of their rare moments alone for the elevator ride down to the set.

"Do you know where the Ocado went last night?" Ocado? That's a white wine, British, why is he even asking about that? Lovino chances a look at the slightly taller man, the blonde standing with his hair tied back and a French tricolour bandana over his head, his beard a bit longer than normal down his chin and jaw. He's practically glaring at the metal doors in front of them as Lovino tries to think back on that awful service.

"Didn't you have it?" Bonnefoy was doing something with chicken broth and leeks in his corner, the white would go well in that. "I didn't touch the wines." And yet Francis' bottle went missing, leaving him with a salty, bland dish for the judges to choke on right before Lovino gave them a couple garnishes and a cauliflower puree.

"And I saw you turn on your mixer." They share another moment of silence, the elevator is slow in this building. For all that they've spent eight weeks living in the same pent-house and cooking under the same roof, this is the first time they've done anything more than rib one another about culture and cuisine. When Francis offers him a handshake, Lovino remembers that the elevator is one of the few places in the building that doesn't have a camera.

"If I am sent off tonight I will be done with America. If you ever find yourself in the south of France…" Lovino takes his hand and gives it a firm shake. It's not the time, but he's struck by the thought that Gilbert might like to visit France at some point…

"If you stop by Chicago some time… well, I don't know what I can offer. I'm pretty sure I'll be unemployed after tonight." He and Roderich had words eight weeks ago when Lovino told him he was doing this. He got away with it by cashing in all of his vacation time and working a deal to say whatever good things to as many good people about the hotel as possible, but the Empress is definitely not going to take him back if he says what he wants to the judges so he can stay.

"Then come to France!" Bonnefoy grins, and the heavy atmosphere in the elevator feels a little bit lighter as they arrive on their floor and the waiting spy-cams. "I would love to meet your sweet Jillian, she sounds divine." Uuuh…

Who?

* * *

Thursday night is the closest thing Gilbert or Monica have come to a prayer circle since, uh, ever. Their family isn't religious on any side, and to be fair the Vargas' aren't seriously invoking God to make sure Lovino isn't knocked off the show. At least Grandpa Vargas isn't, Feli and Nonna are kind of up in the air on the issue.

Monica is two painful weeks past due at this point, something Gilbert's reminded of every time she puts on that slightly uncomfortable face and shifts a little next to her husband. She's got one hand in Feli's and the other holding Gilbert's, and since Gilbert doesn't care about what the judges have to say to the French guy, he's distracted several times by his cousin's fidgeting.

The conversation with Bonnefoy breaks down as: you knew it would taste like shit, but you served it anyways now how is that okay?

"Cuz? You okay?" Gilbert asks the question and it's probably the only thing that can pull Feliciano's attention away from the television. Monica is a fair-skinned girl anyways, tall with nice blue eyes and very fair blonde hair just a few shades darker than Gilbert's, but she looks pale right now.

"It's nothing. The baby's kicking a lot. I think." Um, she thinks? "It- It feels a little strange, but I'm fine." Strange and pregnant don't go together! "Gilbert, stop. Look!"

Gilbert doesn't want to look, but he holds his breath and Lovino's there on the screen, grinding his teeth as the judging panel doesn't even bother cutting into him: the man in the middle just spreads his hands as if to ask "So?" and figure out his excuse.

"_The fact is: you failed to meet every objective of the challenge."_

"_There were timing issues, yes. With the amount of time I was given I couldn't afford any mistakes."_ Lovino hates being drilled like this, Gilbert can see it in the way he shifts and has his hands locked behind his back. He's probably digging his nails into his wrists the way Gilbert hates, and there's no way to reach through the television and tell him to calm down.

"_You squandered your time by refusing to use the ingredients provided for you. What good is a vision if you can't realize it for your guests?" _Oh shut up!

"_Well, are they my guests or are they my customers?"_ Huh? Oh, that catches the panel off guard, and Gilbert feels his cousin squeeze his hand a little harder. _"Are you judging me on objectives or cooking? This is a competition and I get that, but if I'm going home tonight then it's because I messed up on technicalities, not because I'm a bad chef."_

"_Explain the distinction to me: you say guests and customers like they aren't the same thing."_ Lovino takes a deep breath, and the fact that there're no distracting cuts or music right now tells Gilbert his boyfriend is about to take a huge professional risk:

"_Customers are the people I serve at the hotel, that's when I cook someone else's menu with their cheap ingredients. Guests are the people I serve at my table, and I won't make them eat cardboard and still call myself a chef."_

Somewhere in the heart of downtown Chicago, Lovino Vargas' name was just struck from the pay and employment rolls of the Empress Hotel. If Gilbert listens very carefully he can almost hear Edelstein screaming.

"_Lovino we've already been over this, the ingredients provided-"_

"_Have been sitting in those shitty boxes for days, probably weeks, maybe even longer!" _And now that he's unemployed, Lovino lets his teeth out. _"You don't package pasta in a god-damned box, you put it in glass so it doesn't taste like paper when you go to cook it! The only things you put in good pasta are eggs and flour, none of that shit printed on the side of the box- because I read it before I tossed it out! If you send me home because I didn't get the meal together then fine, I can handle that, but if you try and tell me I'm not a good chef because I didn't serve shitty food to the people at my table, then fuck you."_

"_Yes!" _One of the judges bangs her fist on the table, nodding and turning to look at the other three. "_That is exactly what we've been saying."_

"_What, that I go home because someone stole the wine from my station?" _The Frenchman is getting riled up on screen, and Gilbert is so fucking glad that they know someone was fucking with them. When he saw that upload on his computer this morning he almost smashed Gilbird's cage into the wall.

"_Or that he goes home because someone sabotaged his main course? Of course not."_ Why would the head judge say something like…? "_Raivis, please enter." _YES!

"Fuck yeah!" You're not supposed to swear in front of Nonna but _fucking hell yeah!_ The return of the shitty editing and bad music is like a wave of relief down his back, because Lovino and that other guy both turn around as the doors behind them open and that young, docile-looking kid from the ranks does the walk of shame across the floor.

"And everything is better now!" Nonna announces, rising with both hands in the air to thank God for not letting the sticky-fingered criminal get away. They blurred out the roach's face in the videos to build the suspense, but as much as Gilbert wants to be upset that it was the nice guy pulling shit like that, he's just so damn happy that his boyfriend is _not_ taking the fall for this. "I will go make some coffee, and Monica I have herbal tea, should I-?"

The way Nonna Vargas turns and stops dead makes Gilbert pull his eyes off the screen and the almost violent way the judges are gouging the younger chef. Monica hasn't loosened her grip on him, and when he looks he can immediately tell that her lips are pursed and she's not breathing properly. Feliciano panics before Gilbert can get his head around it:

"Bella? Monica? Darling what's wrong?" Oh, Feli is not the guy to have around in a crisis. "Please, bella, say something! Is it the baby? ...Oh God, we need an ambulance!" What the fuck does the army _do_ to people so Monica's face is barely showing anything right now? Gilbert threads his fingers around his cousin's hand and lets her grip as hard as she needs to, which is _really fucking hard._

"Monica, did your water-?"

"Five minutes ago." She grunts the words. "Contractions for ten. Evenly spaced." Why didn't she say anything!? "The elimination-" THEY COULD HAVE FUCKING RECORDED IT.

"Grandpa get the keys!"

"Doctor's number! Someone call him!"

"D-Does it hurt?"

"_YES."_

And away they go.

* * *

**Fem!Germany is hardcore mama who wants to make sure her brother-in-law is okay. If there had been anything out of order with her contractions she would have said something sooner, promise.**

**Review!**


	4. The Best Ingredient

**Yellow,**

**NQSAnon I think it was you who mentioned Hell's Kitchen, but I think you meant **_**MY LIFE. **_**I'll be honest it's Gordon Ramsay's new show that inspired this, because he makes it look so damned easy and I was already RPing Chef!Lovi with a friend...**

**But there is a sad lack of Happy!Feli in my archive, so we get unnecessary-but-I-don't-care chapter 4.**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

The Best Ingredient

Francis is one of the fastest chefs Lovino has ever seen hold a knife. The man can carve, chop, peel, mince, dice, julienne, filet and trim almost anything before he can even figure out what the ingredient is. He should be fucking intimidated every time he sees the Frenchman touch his toolkit. His hands don't shake like Lovino's do when he's plating something delicate under pressure, so his meals are by far the prettiest of the competition.

But his pallet sucks.

"Honestly, sir you are the most picky man I have ever met, and I trained for six years in Paris."

"Yeah, but did you eat anything while you were there?" Because they were the bottom two, and even though they weren't sent home, the kitchen is still theirs to clean all alone. As an added punishment for not being booted out like they were supposed to, all of the silverware also needs a good polishing. "You stewed beets in lemon juice. Why the _fuck_ would you do that?"

Francis doesn't answer, but he finds a way to make polishing a spoon look like a mild threat. To be fair, it was his only other major screw-up of the competition, and on a team challenge one of the other members on his side decided not to cook the pork all the way through. Poison beats the devil's pallet cleanser.

They're interrupted from their late chores by a sound they're not used to: the dining room's front doors rattle and then unlock, letting two men dressed like the crew hurry inside. This is interesting, and Lovino feels a little bit like a zoo animal looking at the open cage wondering if it's worth it to sneak out, but one of the men is on a cell-phone and locks onto him before breaking into a light jog.

"Yes, yes he's right here. This is exactly what this line is for, and-" A very familiar but muffled voice shrieks through the tiny ear-piece, and Lovino is on his feet immediately, not even aware of the camera the second man is carrying as he makes a grab for the phone.

"Feli!?"

"_IT'S THE BABY IT'S THE BABY-" _When those words drill into his head, Lovino's vision whites out a little bit. He can't see the wine-red carpets or the stylish modern chairs and tables. The men from the crew are just bodies hanging in front of him, even the guy he was just chatting with is nothing but a semi-solid blur in the background. "_YOU SAID YOU'D BE HERE AND YOUR NOT WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO LOVINO SHE'S HAVING A __**BABY!**__"_ He suddenly can't function with a continent of space between him and his family.

But wait. Is there, like, a problem with the baby?

"_I-I don't think so?_"

"Then why the hell are you calling me? Go sit with your fucking wife!" Actually if his brother hangs up Lovino will find a way to call him back and then strangle him through the line. Feliciano is honestly the last person you want in your corner when things get hectic, and everyone, even Feli himself, knows that Monica is the eggshell that protects her husband's runny yellow insides. "Stop crying and be a man, damn it!"

"_You're supposed to-"_

"I can't fucking be there, Feliciano!" Even if he was allowed to leave, which he's almost positive he's not without forfeiting the competition, getting a ticket and on a plane will still get him there after the birth is over- unless something goes wrong… "Listen to me! She's your wife, it's your baby, now stop acting like you don't know what to do!"

"_But I don't-_" NO SHUT UP.

"This is the only thing you've talked about for the last year, you little shit!" Someone is recording this, he's positive, he can feel Satan's recording eye following him around and realizes that's because he's pacing around the dining room now. "So just- listen! The only things you don't know right now are the gender and whether you've got enough fucking diapers at your house!" Which is a lie: they have more than enough of everything because between Nonna's excitement, Monica's obsession with being prepared, and Feli's absentminded nature, they're going to need two babies to use up all the supplies their apartment is stuffed with. "Now stop it and don't you dare drop my nephew!"

He bites his tongue and hears someone choke on a laugh, but he realizes his mistake too late to interrupt the:

"_AAAAAAH WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT!?" _Shit- Shit, Feli he didn't really mean- "_WHAT IF I DO!? OH MY GOD WHAT IF I DO WHAT IF I DROP THE BABY OH MY __**GOD**__-" _Ahhh, this is the opposite of what Lovino wanted. He can feel a headache coming on and closes his eyes, grumbling to himself and trying to wait for his brother to take a breath so he can interrupt the hysterics.

Instead, Feliciano's wailing suddenly falls into the background, and a voice Lovino hasn't heard in nine agonizing weeks comes laughing through the line.

"_Okay, what the fuck did you say to him?" _His entire body feels warm and Lovino just wants to lay down on the floor and drown in the feeling. "_Seriously, Vino, you actually put him on the floor hugging his knees. I think the nurses are fetching him a blanket._"

"It's 'cause he's weak."

"_No shit, but my cousin's kinda asking for him." _Is she okay? "_She seems fine and the doctor's pretty chill about everything." _That, at least, is a blessing in itself and Lovino just sinks down into one of the hall chairs, running a hand back through his hair and trying to tell himself there's no way the show can tap this phone-call: but that's a lie. _"You though, you're a pain in the ass to get a hold of. This is the emergency number."_ Which is why the crew came bursting in at 10 o'clock at night to find him. It's got to be nearly 2am back home, so that and Feli's incomprehensible screaming are probably what got them running to connect the call.

There's a few moments of relative silence, and Lovino can feel every love-sick pain in his gut flare up because all the words he wants to say are prefaced with so much gushy junk he can't stand it.

"_Everybody misses you. And you scared the shit out of us with that pasta incident."_

"Don't even talk to me about that. Don't ever fucking talk about it." He can't wipe the smile off his face, and it's so hard not to demand Gilbert start spouting whatever nonsense will help Lovino fill his exhausted reserves. Hearing his voice is actually making it worse because now he wants more: he wants Gilbert's aftershave and the way the light hits his pale hair at night, he wants to notice the callouses on his hands that feel so good on his body, and to taste him when he's tipsy from a beer with the guys.

"I wanna go home, I swear to God…"

"_Don't joke about that, asshole."_ Gilbert knows not to say what they both want to say, because they talked about this and his boyfriend agreed: no one's gonna happily put a fag on the cover of a magazine, and if they do then he'll just be another token gay for the rest of this grueling competition. _"How long do you think they're gonna let us talk? Your shouting worked, he's gone inside now." _If there's no more immediate drama to film, then…

"About five seconds." Lovino looks up when he hears footsteps, and the crew rep in shirtsleeves and a couple wires is frowning at him sympathetically. "Hey, hey-!"

"_What?_"

"All my love, okay?" He's getting fucking emotional which is really embarrassing, but he can't help it. "All of it." Gilbert scoffs, but Lovino knows the difference between his _'ew gross'_ snort and his _'I-It's not like I feel the same way! S-Stupid!'_ half-laugh, and he loves him so much for failing to brush this off.

"_How the hell are you gonna win if you give the best ingredient away?_" Lovino's not gonna cry, he's not gonna let it happen. He is not going to cry, damn it. "_So take some of ours in return, and go kick some ass._"

"Tell Feli dad would be proud."

"_Your Nonna wants you to know that __**she's**__ proud."_

Fuck, he's crying.

* * *

The technician knows the contract, and he knows enough media law that after he takes the phone back and the competitors retire upstairs, he places a call back to that Chicago cell number.

Because if the family doesn't sign a consent form, then the show can't legally broadcast their image.

And a birth kind of counts as an emergent issue.

So.

Yeah.

* * *

Two hours later at 4am local time, Gilbert returns to the hospital after driving Nonna and Grandpa Vargas home. He should probably go home too, but he had to bring Monica's over-night bag since they forgot it in the car.

He's just setting the little suitcase down when he looks up at the family sleeping on the bed. Feliciano might be a flighty little wuss, but he's a good man and he's going to be a great father: he's passed out on the hospital bed with his wife's blonde head tucked under his chin, one arm around her shoulders and the other lightly draped across her and the baby. Gilbert's never seen his cousin glow or look quite so feminine before, but despite the dried sweat and exhaustion she's managed to twist her blanket-wrapped body around her child and press her face close against her husband.

The hospital bed is way too small for two grown adults, but throw hour-and-a-half old baby Amelia between them and there's plenty of room. She was passed around like a pink-swaddled potato already with Feli and his Grandfather both panicking about dropping the precious bundle. Gilbert found it hilarious because of the five of them, Feliciano was the one with the strongest grip, followed by the great big Roman who needed his wife to place the baby in his arms so he didn't crush or break her.

Lovino's niece is red-faced with her eyes squinted shut now, snuggled between her parents and ready to sleep for, oh, probably just the next forty minutes.

So Gilbert snaps a picture, and with explicit instructions that no company has any right to redistribute this EMERGENT ISSUE beyond the intended recipient, he sends the file labelled "Love" to that California contact.

* * *

In real life the birthday dessert challenge happens on Sunday of that week.

For the public, including the viewership in Chicago, the sparkling gelato and spun-sugar creation Vargas puts together shows up on their screens on Tuesday. The judges and Lovino all know he's not a baker, a confectioner, or really all that good with the sweeter end of the spice-rack, but the average joe can't figure out why the dessert he calls "_Piccinina_", or "_cute-kinda-chubby-little-one-shut-up-it-doesn't-translate"_ for his niece doesn't beat out Francis' chocolate torte, or the three other desserts that pull him dangerously close to the bottom two again. The network doesn't much care though, because when they post the recipes on their website Lovino's amasses ten thousand hits in the first day, beaten only by Francis' cake which gets twelve.

Their rivalry is being blitzed across the airways and internet, now if only those two would stop being so chummy on camera… Fiddlesticks.

* * *

**That last line sounded way more threatening than it was supposed to, so I added fiddlesticks because apparently Beek's 2PArthur is one of the execs.**

**Review!**


	5. Bonus Round

**Hall of Fame.**

**Ahh, I forgot to answer a question! In this fic I've headcanon'd Grandmano as their grandmother, because it's an AU and that can totally happen somehow. I've never seen a good Nyo!Rome before so if anyone has I wouldn't mind a reference. I like Mama!Greece for the role too, but again she doesn't have a canon image.**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

Bonus Round

Because of how fucked up time and dates are while Lovino's away, the family has accepted that he is permanently ahead of them. Keeping this in mind, there's no point ever wondering _'what's he thinking now?' _while watching the show, because he's always already through whatever it is by the time they see it. This drives Gilbert insane most of the time, but when he gets a curious e-mail from the show two and a half grueling months into the separation, a family meeting is called.

They know something Vino doesn't: there's a bonus round coming up next week. The paperwork and contact can't tell them what the challenge will be, but they're willing to confirm that Lovino is staying on for the 13th week, so he's eligible for the prize.

The prize is two plane tickets from Chicago to San Francisco, and with five adults and a newborn sitting around the table the silence is suffocating. No one wants to be the first person to shout _"Me!"_ and claim one. There's also no guarantee Lovino will win the bonus round anyways, so…

"Well, I think…" In the month since Amelia's birth, Feliciano hasn't changed so much as he's just not been allowed to get any sleep. The extended silence is threatening to put him under, so when he starts to speak Gilbert pulls his eyes off the tri-folded bundle of papers that showed up in his apartment mail-box yesterday. Lovino's brother doesn't usually take charge in any situation, but with a shrug under his blue-collar, the high-school English-and-art teacher makes a strong suggestion. "Nonna and Gilbert."

Bad idea.

"Oh, no. I can't." Nonna brings her wrinkled hands up immediately, softly refusing as she shakes her head and starts to stand up. Now, Gilbert knows why he can't go, but why not the grandma? "Someone has to cook for Grandpa Nonno."

"Ey, what?" Grandpa Vargas, or _'Grandpa Grandpa'_ as they keep calling him since the birth, looks up where he's sitting at the head of the table, baby Amelia zonked out for her Saturday morning nap in the old man's large hands. He's been doing that a lot, finding a way to hold the infant without actually requesting a turn, and then getting lost in his own head while she sleeps or grasps at the cross usually hanging around his neck. "Just two days? I have my granddaughter-in-law, you go with him."

The old man must be pushing eighty, but he's resisted withering like most people in his generation and is almost as broad in the shoulders as Gilbert's brother Ludwig. He keeps a bit of a salt-and-pepper beard around a strong jaw Lovino inherited a softer version of, his colours a bit darker than any of his grandsons but going progressively whiter with time. He's got scars on his hands and face from working in a machine shop long before safety gear became the norm, but he's gentle with them as he coddles his great-granddaughter over his heart. He's a big softy sometimes, but he's also one of the last hold-outs in the family when it comes to using Gilbert's name.

Considering the generation leap, he's honestly just thankful the old man lets him in the house at all…

"Why send me? You want my grandson to fuss that his Nonna is okay? Is she comfortable? Did she take her pills? I will write a letter, or do the recording thingy so he can hear me." None of them are blind, and it's obvious Nonna Vargas's frown is twice as deep as it ought to be for frustration with a silly idea. She's worrying a handkerchief between her old hands, but won't budge. "Feliciano and Gilbert, that's better."

Feli's head immediately turns to his wife, and Gilbert is curious about the exchange when Monica looks at _him_ and then tries to settle her husband: "Ludwig is in town, and I can come here if I need anything." As cute as Feliciano's worries are, when he looks past Gilbert's cousin and over to the sleepy bundle in his grandfather's arms, the problem goes deeper.

"She isn't sleeping through the night yet…"

"She's only a few weeks old, she's not supposed to."

"Yes, but I-"

They're going to be at this for hours, because the only seat the rest of the family can agree on is Gilbert's, and he just…

* * *

When it gets down to six competitors, not being in the top two slots means you're falling behind. Lovino never thought he'd be thankful for those brief times in his childhood and early teen years when their mother dragged them out of the city to go "camping", but the anxiety of remembering what it's like to only have two big logs and no hatchet for kindling _in the fucking rain_ are what get him through a wilderness round.

It's not fun tearing through the woods in teams of three looking for caches of food and supplies, but he's never cooked moose or pine-cones so those ingredients are left to Toris and Katyusha to scratch their heads over: meaning Lovino has to start the fucking fire.

They find out later, during judging, that Francis' team managed to catch a large log and get it to burn, but it was a pain in the ass to get the pans heated evenly. It makes the bed of embers Lovino's couple thousand pieces of thin-split wood created look a lot less pathetic, and it means their roasted game stew with wild veg impresses old man Jones a lot more than the blue team's expertly prepared but poorly cooked salmon back.

It's a four hour drive back to civilization, and the red team is told they'll receive a special prize tomorrow afternoon for winning. This smells fishy to Lovino, but he just pulls the little square of paper out of his wallet that has his brother's family printed on it, and he finds it a lot easier to ignore the splinters in his ass and remember why he's doing this.

Only their team is met with a bonus round early the next morning: prepare one solid dessert using theme ingredients from the farms and wilderness they were lost in yesterday. He fucking hates desserts, but since there's no threat of elimination Lovino grabs those pine-cones and a bottle of honey and tries to figure out what the fuck people in California actually eat on a regular basis.

He hates admitting it, but ever since he lost his job at the half-way mark Lovino has actually started having fun with this. He talks more in the ridiculous booth, mostly to tell the editing staff how fucking stupid most of the challenges are, and he doesn't even know what he expects roasted pine-seeds and filo pastry to taste like as he pretends he has any fucking clue how to plate a dessert.

"_Gil loves Greek food. Won't say it to my face because Italian is obviously better, but sometimes I see those baklava packages in the garbage."_

Baklava isn't so big in Italy, but he's cooked enough Italian dishes to get a warning from the judges to step up his game. Layers of hair-fine pastry sheets, California honey, crushed pine-nuts instead of walnut or pistachio, and a little bit of sesame paste instead of more honey to keep it from being too sweet, and he presents a light but earthy dessert that… will probably taste like a mouthful of dirt.

Who the fuck is he kidding it sounds like shit: just look at those ingredients.

But it's better than a pine-needle infusion using peaches that weren't quite in season, so not sweet enough to take the medicinal flavour of the tea. And the judges look down on a spoonful of sweet cream, known as an _amuse,_ because one of the judges considers Toris' result a joke for being so small.

But they're all still winners, because Katyusha's husband and twins are waiting behind a closed door for her and Toris' brothers start chanting his name before the judges are even finished talking. Lovino barely comprehends the words _"-dessert featured in this month's issue of California Living,"_ because all the blood is rushing to his ears and eyes telling him it's okay to faint and cry at the same time on television.

Everybody goes rushing to their families, but Lovino will trip over himself and break bones if he tries moving. Instead, he just sits down on the carpeted floor with both hands over his face and lets Feliciano try and fail to drag him up to his feet. The two of them are left on the floor with his younger brother laughing at him, and his sister-in-law smiling as she kneels down and presents Amelia Vargas to her gob-smacked uncle.

Yes, his first thought was Gilbert. Yes, the person he's wanted to see most since this whole thing started is Gilbert. But yes, he understands why this is the decision, and the hand-written letter from Gilbert explains it better than Lovino can through his stupid heart-aching tears: what was Gilbert gonna do if he showed up? Shake his hand? Clap him on the back and go "Good job, man. You the man, man."? No.

They would have hugged.

And then kissed.

And kept kissing, and started saying stupid mushy things through the kissing.

And Lovino doesn't actually care what the rest of the country would think if that happened. And he doesn't care about the camera in the hotel bedroom: they're down to six and he has his own room now, if the editing crew wanted to watch him show his boyfriend how much he's missing him then they could have just pulled up a seat.

"She's perfect." So it makes sense why Gilbert isn't here, and when Amelia reaches those itty-bitty little fingers out from inside her uncle's trembling arms, one kind of heartache is eased by an overwhelming rush of love. "She's stunning, she-" Lovino has never been choked by a girl before, but the newborn gets a grip on his pinky finger and it slams all the words back in his throat so hard he can't breathe.

Feliciano has an arm hooked around his shoulders, grinning down at his daughter like he's more happy to see her than Lovino, and he doesn't hold it against his brother at all: who the hell wouldn't prefer this tiny, perfect, blue-eyed bundle? He's dead serious, and he can't figure out how Nonna and Nonno let them put her on a plane to visit him.

"Grandpa cried." Feliciano says it like a joke and Monica gives him a reproving look. Lovino isn't listening and just gives his niece a kiss on her soft, warm forehead.

He's an uncle.

* * *

"_Jill and I can't have kids, so yeah this is important to me." _When you've been in the industry this long, you know it takes time for newbies to warm up to the camera. The next issue of _California Living _runs with a two-page article and interview with the chef they're pushing as the "Middle King": he's trained in Mediterranean cuisine, which, they remind everyone, is latin for "mid-earth", and hails from what's more or less considered Middle America by the marketing team. _"She's the first girl in three generations, we're a little overwhelmed: all my aunts were my mother's sisters."_

But enough about family: MONE- I mean PERSONALITY! Yeah, personal stuff, haha… _right._

The article is all about emotional gushing and pictures of plates Vargas was told to cook up for the photoshoot: all recipes of his from throughout the competition, with their ingredients photo-shopped in the background. They get a rare picture of him smiling and slap it on the right column, sending multiple e-mails to the family trying to get a picture of Jill only to get images of everybody else instead. Are these people daft?

They know Jill is a tall, blonde, working woman who lets her man do all the cooking. They want her face. They were surprised but sympathetic when it was the brother and his wife who showed up instead of the girlfriend, but it's been getting better as the weeks go by. They've been together for two years and all those corny marker messages, which Lovino has kept up for three solid months, are all for her. It's everything the execs want, and the fans love a romantic sub-plot. The social networks put the idea in the executive's head instead of the other way around: proposal?

Marriage proposal? Wedding montage? Rags to riches chef makes it big and proposes to his girlfriend during the finale?

Hell yeah, they want a piece of that.

They scrap the week fifteen's "Castles in the Sand" tropical theme and harass several bridal parlors and magazines, taking a calculated risk with Vargas' weakness with sweets by prepping a wedding theme instead. They are not rigging the competition, but Vargas in the finale is fast becoming the network's favourite wet-dream. That or Bonnefoy and his separation woes and daughter in London: they love that one too, but it has less marketing potential.

A wedding is the start of something incredible, the beginning of a new life for two new people.

They run that as the hook and send one of the crew on a casual errand during a different interview with Vargas and Bonnefoy: is the name supposed to be J-i-l-l or J-i-l? There have been tiffs on the issue.

The higher-ups love that darling blush he puts on as he balks at the question, but the marketing staff are confused when Vargas asks why they're even spelling it with a J to begin with.

Gil?

Gill?

Da fuq, is she a fish?

* * *

**I have no idea if I spelt Ukraine's human name right, but Katyusa came up the most. Toris is Lithuania and the last name dropped should be Gupta: Egypt.**

**I don't think I've ever written more concentrated cute at any point, so leave a comment, yo.**


	6. Quality Programming Provided By

**Mr. Hurricane, Oppa Gangnam Style, Please Don't Leave me.**

**AND MIQ IS PERFECT SHE DID IT AGAIN WITH THE STORY COVER LOOK AT IIIIT...**

**This chapter didn't have to happen, but it did, and I had too much fun with it. I think it answers those comments about closeting better than a response would have****: but I did read them! I read all the reviews! I keep my inbox open all day for them! Please review, I love it!**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

Quality Programing Provided By

Unbeknownst to the average American viewer, the various departments which plug away at putting on the nation's favourite programming actually do communicate with each other: it's not just the execs and networks making every little decision.

So when the publicists encounter a funny little issue, they send someone to talk to the writers, who get in touch with PR because Vargas must have written the full name down somewhere. Lovino Vargas' contract isn't at risk: they're checking his file for important information. Feliciano Vargas' name comes up in the usual places- emergency number, home address, etc. but the next-of-kin slot is a curiosity for someone who's been in a committed relationship for two years.

Unless that relationship is with one Gilbert Beilschmidt.

Gilbert.

Gil.

Jill?

Oh my.

But the year is 2012, and this is California of all places, and it's the TV industry. The woman in Human Resources who uncovers the hidden anomaly twists her lips and goes "hmph" before dismissing the issue as yet another case of '_the hot ones are always gay'. _

The Producer has more important shit to deal with so his assistant doesn't bother him, and he talks to the Editing department instead. They're surprised no one else on the crew knew: they've been clipping slipped pronouns and the like from Lovino's exhausted voice and video moments for weeks. They figured it was just safer that way. If he was out, as in, like, "Out", the way Toris was with his rainbow wrist-band and stuff, then he wouldn't be so awkward and careful about always referring to "Jill" as a genderless thing.

Besides, they've already caught him looking at pictures in his wallet numerous times even before the baby incident. _'I don't carry pictures'_ my ass, Vargas.

The assistant communicates back to the writers and publicists to change the spelling, and he's already packaged off a basket of network swag as a "no hard feelings, right?" to Mr. Beilschmidt before he can sue them for misrepresentation. "Jill" is struck from the season box-set and replaced with the correct name: "Gil". However, they keep the subtitles on the active episodes in place because, well, ehh…

The Producer finally remembers to ask about what was a simple spelling issue, and when he hears the story the entire network loses its shit.

* * *

Meanwhile, Gilbert is pleased with the random box of swag on his doorstep. And he's even happier that Lovino hasn't tried to drag them both so far into the closet that he changed his name to keep the secret. He's been worrying about that…

His boyfriend is in the remaining four, and the only person who doesn't care how this ends is baby Amelia.

* * *

DO NOT PANIC NOW IS NOT THE TIME TO PANIC OH GOD THIS IS NOT WHAT THEY THOUGHT WOULD HAPPEN IS THIS GOOD THEY'RE NOT SURE.

THEY'RE JUST A SLEEZY NETWORK THEY'RE A-POLITICAL JESUS CHRIST.

CAN THEY GET THE HAWAII ARC BACK?

HAWAII PLEASE?

PLEASE?

No they can't. But after a bit of screaming and wild panic behind closed doors they remember that even the sleeziest of networks and executive panels still has to sit down and make a decision.

They already had Toris: the openly gay, middle-of-the-pack contestant who performed solidly and was cut from the top six. When Toris won the family prize his brothers came up and there was a lot of hugging and family support things happening. Their ratings didn't really shift one way or the other on the issue, but there are two distinct differences between Toris and Lovino.

Toris was never favoured to win.

And they've built up an entire season of longing and romance between Lovino and the infamous Jill. Jill is now a Gil which is short for Gilbert, who with only a bit of facebook poking and cyberstalking should have come up on their radar weeks ago.

For fuck's sake the top 3 are going to be designing dream wedding menus, and unless Vargas chokes it's going to be Gupta who leaves this week.

"If we want to avoid the issue completely, then we make it family-only: the boyfriend can't come."

"Bonnefoy doesn't have family in the country: his ex took their daughter back to England, and all of his remaining contacts are friends." So Francis either wins alone or loses alone, _nice._

Come on, guys. Work with me here.

"Well, what about the parent?" Elaborate, sweet-heart. "The parent network?" What, did you think small, cheap entertainment networks operated in an industry vacuum? They get on the phone to their parent company, working their way up the chain until they're stopped at someone's desk, very far from the top, and get their answer: there's a sibling station that is so far left they'd gladly take a certain network's rainbow peacock if they could. If the backlash is bad from the general viewership they'll retire the _Game of Cooks_ franchise and relaunch it under a new name on the other channel.

The word from above is that if they've built up the arc they should go with it. And by the way, the representative who tells them this is personally rather offended that they don't think Gupta will stick around for the finale. He emphasizes that no one will lose their jobs over this: they'll just move them, and tells them not to hold their breath on Vargas anyways ":|".

So always remember: any publicity is good publicity.

* * *

The start of this competition was such a long time ago that Lovino doesn't know when the prison drama ended and they all became sort of buddy-buddy and peaceful. If he had to guess though, he'd probably say it was after they reached the top four, so it doesn't really count after Katyusha leaves and it's just himself, Francis, and Gupta Hassan sharing a very large, very quiet penthouse together.

The pent-house is considerably less fashionable or intimidating after three months inside. The leather couches are broken in, the beds have that familiar smell, and no one really bothers making their bed in the morning or making sure their drawers are compulsively neat. Lovino has started drinking beer because it's the closest thing to Gilbert that he can get, so he's making himself swallow the bottled piss after dinner when quiet Gupta decides to speak up for the first time all day.

"Are you gay?"

Did I say swallowing? Sorry, I meant choking it back up his nose trying not to spit it out. Lovino accepts a tissue when Gupta offers the box, the younger chef remaining quiet while the Italian struggles to get the beer out of his nose and lungs. His eyes are watering a little bit and Francis flops down on the couch next to him, a glass of much-better-smelling red wine in his hand.

"_W-What?" _Oh _God._

Gupta is contently sipping on his apple-juice as Lovino cleans his face and sits up, his gut flip-flopping as Francis drops a heavy hand on his shoulder.

"Come now, did you not see the way he _never_ looked at Katyusha?" Shut up shut up _shut_- "Lovino, if the show doesn't want it to air then they won't air it. Forget about the cameras and let's just have a drink."

Lovino does take another drink, longer this time, because as much as he hates beer it tastes a lot better when he needs to not think or speak. He feels braver once he's downed half the bottle, and can ignore the little black dot on the wall that's recording everything.

"What does it matter?" He grunts.

Gupta just shrugs.

"Curious." Well that's a shitty reason to ask a question like- "It isn't mentioned in my country. Toris had a lot to say, and I have his e-mail, but I don't want just one opinion now that I'm here in America." Gupta is one of the civilians who fled the Arab Spring Revolution in Egypt. He's mentioned wanting to go back when things are completely calm, but calm is a relative term in that part of the world.

As far as cooking is concerned: Lovino's been fascinated with how the same ingredients used in the north and western sides of the Mediterranean are used so differently in the south eastern coasts and further into Africa. Whenever Gupta's actually willing to talk, it's been a learning experience.

"If I've insulted you then I apologize. I meant no disrespect." No, he almost never disrespects and Gupta's not wrong either, but…

"I have never met a man more in love and less willing to talk about it." Francis is a real shit to have around sometimes. Lovino can't wait to see him eliminated, except that's a lie: better him than Toris...

"Toris is really open about it because his boyfriend was attacked." Lovino doesn't wanna talk about it, he's got his arms folded tight and he's sitting on one of his feet on the couch. Instead of looking at either man to his left or right, he's staring at that black lens gouged into the wall. "We're not really in the movement so we don't make a big fuss: vote in elections, keep an eye on the news, that's about it." Keep track of where they are in the city, don't hold hands unless they're on a crowded street, agree to keep it a secret while one of them is on television…

Not for the first time since coming here, Lovino finds himself fighting off the urge to go into that little closet and give the whole _'Hey, guess what, I'm about as straight as a curly fry and love taking it up the ass!'_ speech, but he just rubs his throbbing forehead with one hand and tells his stomach to calm down. He doesn't have the nerve for it, not alone in front of the entire country.

He walked away from it for weeks whenever Toris got into one of his rants. He's avoided questions and given vague answers; Gupta's just a blunt personality and Lovino isn't willing to give a flat-out lie. Deflection is one thing, but blatant denial isn't something Gilbert deserves.

"Toris mentioned something about women's cloth-"

"Okay no, stop." Without picking his head up off his hand or opening his eyes, Lovino lifts one finger to stop the conversation. "I don't care what one guy you talked to said, I'll give you _my_ e-mail and then you can ask questions not on camera." Because Christ, he doesn't want to discuss this in front of several million people. Good job, Toris: Lovino can't take the heat.

"And now I'm curious." Shut up, Francis. "Does this mean _you_ own-?"

"I do not, and that's the end of it." Lovino's not offended, he's a fucking prude. "Unless you wanna dish about your sexy ex-wife?" Francis' smile curdles on his face, and Gupta is very preoccupied with not smiling into his apple juice.

"That is an excellent analogy." It's not a fucking analogy _it's the exact same topic._ "Is there a baseball tournament on channel seven, Gupta?"

"I can check." ...

"I need another beer."

* * *

Gilbert will admit, he's sad to see Gupta leave the show. He wouldn't mind meeting the guy as he shakes the judges' hands and gives a friendly good-bye to Lovino and Francis. Sad, mournful music is playing in the background, grey-screen filters looking back on fifteen agonizing weeks of challenge and growth and _yadda-yadda roll the credits_.

Gilbert has to be honest, sixteen weeks are almost over and his bags have been packed for days just waiting for the call down to San Francisco. He knows the moment is here when Nonna Vargas calls him and she's yelling happily about the studio sending them her and Grandpa's tickets. Feliciano and Monica are heavily debating whether they can leave again though: she's still on another two weeks of leave, but Amelia hated both flights the first time and Feliciano's nearly out of vacation days for the rest of the year.

He passed up one ticket to California, but as Gilbert blitzes down the building stairs and past the broken elevator, the sight of something yellow sticking out of his mail slot sends him spinning. It's here, it's time, _finally._

Win or lose, he's gonna answer the plea still ringing in his ears from that little blue closet:

"_I'm dying, Gil. Get me out of this place already!"_

* * *

**I usually edit out the sassy narrator because it's the result of writer's block, but frankly I think it works this time. Almost made the title "Quarity" but there's no Kiku in this story.**

**Question: would people be more interested in a het!Gerita ficlet with Monica and Feli, or a little writing project showing how this Gil and Lovi got together? I'm trying to avoid my HetaOni project…**


	7. Grand Finale

**Please Don't Leave Me.**

**Such consistent reviewers I have! It makes me so happy, honest. And paint-drying sounds like a challenge, Cracker, Gil's a contractor in this universe, remember?**

**My priority is still my HetaOni longfic, but we can have some Lovi-and-Gil shenanigans soon-ish I think. It depends on my muses!**

**By the way I really hope you guys know that I endorse none of these recipes.**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

Grand Finale

It's easy to forget about the set lighting when you're busy cooking under it, but standing up straight for presentation is a lot harder to handle. You'd think he'd be used to it after so many weeks, and in a way he kind of is, but under his stiff and starched chef's coat Lovino Vargas still wants to die.

His head should be focused on the woman speaking in front of him, instead it's stuck on the same thought he's had all week: five more hours until he sees him. He's here in the city, if not the same building, and Lovino has to bend his will to the challenge of listening to the speech for the cameras.

"-two highly skilled and classically trained chefs. I don't have to stand here and remind you that the winner of tonight's challenge will sweep the tournament, taking home a fully prepared array of endorsements, a prize package including five thousand dollars worth of professional cookware, and a cash prize of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars to put towards your own restaurant dreams." THANKS FOR NOT REMINDING THEM, FUCK-ASS.

"For tonight's final competition, you will have two hours to prepare a five course meal using the bounty of America as your pallet." Lovino is not going to complain about a menu that can be pretty much anything, but he hasn't- "Your challenge is to create a meal which fully represents yourselves as chefs. Put your identity on the plate, and the chef with the clearest song will be crowned the winner." He doesn't want poetry right now. "You have each assembled a team of your former competitors and peers, so do not hesitate to use their skills and expertise to come out on top."

Okay. Okay they've been running up to this the entire competition: it's not a case of freezing on the spot, it's the terror of too many ideas suddenly screaming for his limited attention.

"Good luck, gentlemen. May the best chef win."

* * *

It's the closest they've been to each other in months, and Gilbert is still stuck on some kind of creepy observation deck with one-way glass looking down into the kitchen.

If he hadn't just spent the last three months watching this show religiously, he wouldn't understand why there's a British woman with her seven-year-old daughter sitting in the chairs a few seats away from Nonna Vargas and her husband. But he has, and he's impressed by the strings this show must have pulled to get Francis' ex-wife to come across the Atlantic and watch him do this.

There are other people milling around too, network executives and scouting agents. Gilbert is wearing his best black suit with a red silk tie he knows Lovino's fond of, but he didn't bring roses or anything like that because, uh, well he just didn't know if he should or not. He's already had his hand shaken several times by men he doesn't know and can't bring himself to care about right now, listening just enough to catch the names of several magazines and cookware lines he thinks he knows.

The British woman is getting similar treatment, but she's a lot more forward and tells them shortly to please sit down so she can watch the "frog" compete.

"C'mon, c'mon, c'mon…" There's another hour and a half to go, and fuck him if Gilbert can get himself to sit down and stop trying to press his face against the glass. Lovino is in a chef's jacket with a red arm-band over his elbow, a small towel over his shoulder as he's shaving something down over a cutting board. Bodies in red aprons are hurrying around him calling out orders and timing, steaming pots going right and left in the chaos. He knows most of the faces down there, but they're moving too quickly to be sure.

Just like Lovino's knife, because when he looks up to answer a question his whole body jerks violently. Gilbert almost bites through his tongue and has to slap a hand over his mouth to keep from saying anything, because when Lovino charges across the kitchen to the nearest sink he leaves a red stain on the counter he left behind…

* * *

_Shit-!_

"_Mon ami,_ do you really have time for a drink?"

He's got the cold water running over his left hand and pulls a bandage and roll of tape off the shelf over his head with the right. When he drags his hand back out the vibrant red blood is quick to run down his fingers from a long slice down his index finger. Whatever possessed him to ignore how to properly handle a fucking knife needs to get out of his head right now, because as he dries the wound clumsily he starts calling out orders:

"Katyusha get that board in a sink and start another white onion: chopped! Toris I said one inch medallions with that lamb so don't screw with me right now." The cut is long, not deep between the first and second knuckle. A bandage goes around the widest part of the wound and he clips a section of gauze off the roll and painfully puts it around the digit, sealing the messy thing with tape before slapping two gloves on for safety. He's tempted to tape his wrist up too, but just washes his hands and grits his teeth through the pain.

_Then_ he answers Francis.

"Eyes in your own kitchen, Bonnefoy."

"Mine certainly smells better!" –CRASH. "_Mon dieu, Raivis!"_ A slew of French from across the kitchen aisles ends the exchange.

His first hour is almost gone, and as he moves through the chaos in his kitchen Lovino just needs to hit his stride and keep everything that isn't this meal in a taped up little box in the back of his head.

He's not going to fuck this up.

Sixteen weeks, he's going to make tonight worth it.

* * *

"Maybe if we just step aside for a moment and I can explain-" Oh God Gilbert can't afford to be anywhere but here right now, so he can't punch this man in the throat because that will get him removed, if not arrested.

"I really, really don't think you understand right now." Sixteen weeks, sixteen weeks and some fucker is trying to talk to him about a garlic press. Gilbert hopes the fake-ass smile he stretches over his teeth looks threatening as fuck, because his hands are starting to shake because he's so nervous, and he's watching everything from the best seat in the house, and he's being about as useful as those veal trimmings Lovino just swept into the bin. "But I can't talk to you, I'm _watching_ this."

"Mr. Beilschmidt, do you have any idea how much money is in the garlic industry?"

"More than I will _ever_ make, now will you please_ just-_"

A small bell rings somewhere and Gilbert turns away from the businessman in the suit to look for the clock ticking madly away over the kitchen: one hour gone, one left. It doesn't take two hours to cook a meal in a ready kitchen, but they didn't know what they were going to make so nothing, if Gilbert can make sense of all the knife-work he already saw everywhere, was already prepped. No onions, no tomatoes, no spices, no meats, nothing.

"Now look, this is exciting, but-" Gilbert instantly converts to whatever religion will strike this guy mute, and it doesn't work. "-as Mr. Vargas' agent, I think-"

"I am _not_ his agent!" Oh, you know what? Fuck this. He's been cut off, avoided, misrepresented, and silenced for the last three and a half months. He has gone almost a quarter of a year without so much as direct eye-contact with the love of his life, so with Lovino in the middle of his final round and all of them standing on American soil with a shit-load of rights, Gilbert lets loose:

"I am not his agent, I'm not his lawyer, I'm not his realtor, I'm not his banker!" He's gonna get some fucking respect if it kills him! "I'm not his best-fucking-friend, I'm his _boyfriend!"_ He's not screaming, he's _yelling._ "_I'm_ the gay lover, it's _my_ sweater he stole, it's _my_ bird he wants the cat to eat, and _I'm_ the one who can't dress a damn salad on my own!" Has he made himself clear? Good! "Now shut the hell up and let me _freak out in peace!_"

Oh he can't handle this, Gilbert would rather be in any other position right now but yelling at random business men in the cooking equivalent of box seats is killing him. He turns away and leans his arms on the one-way glass again, head between his elbows and struggling to take deep breaths and calm down as he watches what's going on. No one's stopped moving or slowed down, so thank God Lovino didn't hear any of that.

Far away behind him he thinks he hears an old Italian voice ask why someone is bothering his grandson-in-law, and it's that sort of third-person rhetorical question you hear in mobster dramas: threatening without making any blatant accusations. Gilbert really can't handle the solidarity from Lovino's family right now, and when Nonna Vargas cuts away from her husband and comes to hover next to him for a few moments in silence, he presses his palms against his eyes to stop the stupid frustration from coming out in the weakest possible way.

He needs this to end.

This has to end.

He doesn't care of Lovino wins or loses anymore, he just wants him _back…_

"Ve~, Gilbert why is he peeling so many potatoes?"

…What?

* * *

Lovino hates potatoes.

He hates them, he can't eat them, he won't even put them in his mouth.

His hatred extends across all types of potatoes, even the ones that aren't actually potatoes at all: carrots are borderline on his list and parsnips and turnips give him the heebie-jeebies.

But they want soul. They want who he is as a chef and that's a challenge Lovino can meet, especially since he knows how to cook for someone who's so god-damned helpless in the kitchen and comes from a completely different background.

They want a meal he'd serve again and again, one he'd give to his family and put every ounce of himself into. This does not translate into a traditional Italian meal: it's not a salad, an anti-pasta, a pasta and a dessert.

The first course he plates with shaking hands is a twist on a fish taco, because he liked the fast-food version as a kid and when he trained in Spain he saw the same ingredients used properly. Fresh red tomatoes in lime juice and herbs, tossed as a salsa with sweet white onions and crumbled fish filet, served on toasted, fresh-baked ciabatta bread. It's dressed with olive oil and left for last to plate so the bread won't sag and ruin the crunch of the grill. The bread slices are thick but short, because there will be a lot of starch coming the judges' way.

He does have to make pasta, because there were about two years growing up where that was all his little brothers would eat. But he doesn't choose a simple one and he makes sure the pesto sauce is light and eases the creamy cheese stuffed between the thin yellow sheets. The portion is small too, because he knows his brothers can go through about forty of them in a single sitting and then drop into a pasta-induced coma for the next two days.

The next is a twist on the potato soup Gilbert has spent two years describing to him, and he's never been able to make it exactly how the German grandmother did. But he's come close, and that fucking soup is what takes him the better part of two hours. He has two chefs working for him, but he handles the soup alone.

It includes literally the only recipe of Gilbert's that Lovino tolerates, and he got it from Ludwig, not Gil himself: it's a wurst their family has made since the first German thought to cut open a pig and grind up their insides. He thinks it tastes bland, but the number of awards the sausage has tells him to shut his mouth and not deviate from a time-honoured combination of not-enough-garlic and why-is-this-in-here? The raw sausage alone takes thirty minutes, not counting his injured hand, and then cooks down in slices at the bottom of a large pot. It's a simple substitution for most potato soups: no bacon, just sausage. Shredded potato (_ew)_, pureed carrot (_blech)_ and parsnip (_yuck!)_ follow along with a lot of heavy cream and hot water.

He's serving something he actually can't stomach eating, but he knows how awful it's supposed to taste and how many other random things he has to add to get it just right. He doesn't know why he's trusting Gilbert's pallet instead of his own, but he is, and if he loses on account of a shitty soup then he already knows he's not going to be mad about it. This is what he does, it's what he lives for: he cooks for the people who make him happy, and he'll make whatever pasty crap they want so long as they enjoy it as much as Gilbert loves this slop.

So it's salsa he personally takes to work for a snack, pasta his brothers clamour for, a lamb tenderloin like what Nonna prepares every year for Nonno's birthday, a dramatically improved mixed berry gelato for his _piccinina _Amelia, and that fucking soup.

It's the longest and shortest two hours of his life, and when it's over the only thing Lovino wants is Gilbert's sweater and a long plane ride home…

* * *

**I HATE IT WHEN THEY CUT THEMSELVES I HATE IT SO MUCH IT MAKES ME SO NERVOUS. I mean it's absolutely horrid because they're working with stainless steel everything and it's super-frickin' sharp and it goes through meat like nothing and NO NOT OKAY COOKING MANDOLINS MAKE ME SO NERVOUS I SWEAR.**

**And then sometimes they burn their hands on the steel handles and I just want to cry because even if they're a dick it's not faaair ; A;**

**Review! We have 2 more chapters left!**


	8. Commercial Break

**Some Nights, Settle Down, Hall of Fame.**

**I'll be honest, I stole the finale challenge from Top Chef Canada ; 3; Also I realized yesterday that Lovino's starter is pretty tame for the final meal, that had better have been some charming fish...**

**And art! Art makes me so happy, I love art more than reviews sometimes I swear. But I have to make my OCs cooperate in my big-fic before I can work on anymore Prumano... Stupidchapterthirtytwo...**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

Commercial Break

The execs are having champagne and enjoying the entertainment below, along with the confusion in the same room between the sponsors and families. They have better-than-ringside seats for it too, because a tall blonde man with a red tie and short temper has effectively silenced most of the sponsor personnel. The executives would be more upset about this if they weren't already nodding to each other about a new show for a certain fire-cracker Italian chef if he fails to win tonight's competition. They love it, and the sister network will make buckets from these two.

PDAs and Smartphones are keeping close watch over spiking ratings and the fever-pitch of the live audience tuning in to the broadcast. The commercial slots were snapped up for an unhealthy amount of money considering the quality of the program. Nothing draws the numbers quite like a finale.

There are TV screens in this booth along with the windows where the boyfriend who caused such a stir has planted himself and refuses to move. The seven-second delay is enough for the editing staff to work their superb magic and add music, decals, transitions, and a huge number of clever angles. It's winding down to the last few minutes of the competition when the screens cut to commercial, the men in suits shaking hands and keeping a respectful distance from the nervous families watching the chefs below compete.

They're quite sure the Producer is getting ready to keel over from some misguided fear about how this is going to play out on camera. They've already given the order for the crew not to interfere though, and have invited the flakey little man to get a drink once filming wraps up.

But first: elimination.

* * *

One complete meal is served, followed by the second so the judges' pallets aren't thrown off. When they draw for the order Romano pulls the short stick and has to sulk in the back-room for another ten god-damned minutes. A crew member comes in with a camera and they try prodding him to give an interview while he waits, but Katyusha scolds them and makes them stand in the corner. Toris is texting his boyfriend and Lovino has to duck his head down between his knees to avoid the bone-crushing temptation to steal the device out of his hands and call the only person he wants to see more than the judges.

They should have given his phone back, the fuckers. They're showing everything live tonight so there's nothing to spoil anymore, but it's still locked up in a box somewhere not being useful to him.

"So… I've been meaning to ask…" Toris is still texting and Lovino is still sulking, but he lifts his head up carefully when he hears the man from Eastern Europe speak up. "Your wife, is she here tonight?"

"M'not married."

"Sorry, your girlfriend: you know what I meant." This is true… "People are buzzing about you proposing tonight, you know?"

Now what the hell, Lovino has to think about that for a moment in order to process it, then slowly sits up. Toris is wearing the red uniform and he cooked up a storm tonight, following Lovino's orders to the letter and taking it in stride when he lost his temper unintentionally. At least his hand isn't hurting anymore now that the show's doctor has taken a quick look at and cleaned it up, but for a while there he was like a pissy lion with a thorn in his paw.

"If it was legal, maybe I would." The man with the rainbow wristband stops texting. "Illinois' pretty sane, but you know what it's like." When he stops talking Toris is staring at him like he slipped into Italian for some reason, but Lovino's too worn out to bother making himself any more explicit. Katyusha is completely silent next to him, and the camera guy doesn't seem to be pointing the camera at him anymore.

Whatever. He's had more than enough of everything, so when a crew member pokes her head in and tells Lovino he's been granted ten minutes to properly plate his dishes for service- not just the show platters like before- he stands up without an ounce of life left in his limbs. He thanks Toris and Katyusha for their help tonight, and he actually does mean it, so it's not awkward when the confused Ukranian woman with the heart of gold wraps her arms around him and- _ack!_

_Ribs breaking, lungs collapsing, light fading…!_

"Kat-!"

It's not the hug he wanted, it doesn't recharge him at all, and despite the kind sentiment behind it he almost gets lost on his way back to the kitchen. He wakes up just enough to remember all the senses he needs in order to plate four of each meal properly, because again, this competition actually cares about the food, so they wouldn't expect him to put half-hour old plates in front of the judges.

Lovino barely has the strength left to stand there as he presents his meals, offers a few words on each course, and devotes what little brain power he has left to taking the criticism and comments they give him as they taste, savour, and maybe even start to enjoy what he's made…

Thirty minutes, give-or-take…

* * *

Gilbert can't explain why Lovino is serving something he hates to the judges who will make or break the last sixteen weeks. He's almost positive he understands why that potato soup Lovino loathes is on the menu, but he just cannot, for the life of him, explain it to the troubled grandparents.

But the judges can:

"_This is just so different from anything we've seen from you before."_

"_You've only brought us potatoes maybe three times throughout this competition, and I just don't understand why you've held back."_

"_My first thought was that it was bland: I'm used to your plates coming at us with a punch of lime or oregano, or drizzled in some kind of tomato-acid something, but there's such a subtle art going on here that I really have to stop and work through it."_

"_You've given us spicy, and sweet, and sour, and crunchy, and all kinds of flavours and textures tonight and throughout, but this is the first meal I've had in a long time that just feels so warm. I really just want to curl up in a blanket with a bowl of this in my lap."_

They find the fish salsa fun and well balanced. The stuffed pasta gets him a warning look but raves over taste and presentation. They have a hundred more things to say about the soup, but it somehow manages to outshine the almost lovingly brazed lamb tenderloin. The dessert right at the very end cleanses the pallet of so many heavy ingredients, and Lovino is dismissed back to the other room to wait for the judges' decision.

Gilbert and the rest of the observers suffer with having the sound turned off in their box as the judges confer. When they're directed downstairs through several corridors, he can feel himself stumbling a little bit trying to walk straight.

One of the judges asked Lovino to pick one word to describe his meal. Lovino is never concise enough for one word, but he did it.

He said love.

* * *

The studio lights are bright and burning his skin, the lack of sleep and food and water is dragging him further into a nauseous pit. If they keep amping up the tension and pausing so dramatically for the music Lovino can't hear and the extra footage he can't stand, he might just faint.

Stop praising them and get on with it, enough about knife-work and flavour and souls and singing. He wants to be in this moment because he knows his career is better for having gone through this back-breaking experience, but he's a thousand miles away on the streets of his city.

He's planning the route he's going to take from the airport out to Feliciano's house, because he's going to hug and hold that little baby until she's old enough to start school. And from there he'll go to his grandparents' home, the place where he grew up with his brothers after a car accident and things they don't talk about took their parents away. He'll stand in the first kitchen he ever boiled water in and kiss his Nonna because she was the one who made him stand next to her and watch her make dough and chop onions.

It's distressing but his mind can't plot the familiar route from his childhood home back to his apartment: it keeps getting lost on street corners and one-way roads. One second imaginary sunshine is flashing in his eyes, and the next he's being thrown around by the blustering wind or wallowing in heavy snow. He can put himself in the building but he can't find it on the street. He doesn't know where that green gate and the yellow stone have gone, his mental map is marred by a cigarette burn over his home, and it's crumpled from all the fear he hasn't let himself get stuck in until now, right now.

He should be listening to the professionals in front of him talking about seasoning and temperature, he should hear what they're saying and stop thinking about anything that isn't food and flavour and skill, but he can't.

He's lied. He's lied for sixteen weeks about the most important person in his life, and it's taken him until right now to actually understand what that means. He's been so fucking ashamed of something he dealt with years ago in school and learned to accept and try to like about himself, and he let it do something he suddenly doesn't know if he can forgive.

He's been counting down the hours and minutes since yesterday, that's how badly he wants to see Gilbert again. He put everything he had into creating a meal he knows his man would love, but he completely silenced his name and wouldn't even show his picture on camera. Now it hits him: what if Gilbert knows what he's done? He wasn't angry on the phone or distant in his letter, but what if he's realized what Lovino is realizing right now: that he lied about and denied him? What if he's not even here?

"Congratulations, Lovino, you are our last chef standing."

* * *

Don't run, don't run, just walk and-

"_Madeline!"_

Well shit if the little girl can run then so can Gilbert!

He doesn't sprint past the girl but he does keep pace with the seven-year-old, pulling open the studio door for the child who drops her stuffed white teddy to fly on set. She's calling out in French for her papa, and Gilbert's senses are confused by stepping into a dining room he's only ever seen through the television screen.

The entrance is behind the judges' table. He can barely see what's beyond them until the little girl's red dress reappears again: she's just been swung up into the air by an exuberant parent. Gilbert hustles as quickly as he can across the carpeted floor, and stops dead when he sees both Lovino's hands clapped up over his face, tears running down from blood-shot green eyes.

Oh damn, he lost…

But God, Gilbert just doesn't care.

"It's okay…" He just wants to get to him and stop those tears, it's his only goal right now.

"I'm sorry, I'm so-" No, he has nothing to apologize for and as Gilbert hurries up to him he doesn't know if it's okay to sweep him up into his arms like he- "_Please don't leave me over this..._"

Hah?

Oh, fuck the cameras then, and the judges, and the crew, and all the other people who don't need to be here right now but still are. He pushes Lovino's hands out of the way and takes his head between his palms, everything so solid and real from the hot tears to the way his coarse and slightly curly hair feels between his fingers. He pulls him in and those green eyes close before he gets there, a quick breath escaping between them before everything else fades away.

Lovino's warm arms wrap around under his shoulders, his dirty apron griming up the blonde's best shirt and pants as they fall into each other. Gilbert only has an inch or two of height over him and Lovino's strong on his own, so it almost hurts to get squeezed like this but he ignores it because of who's doing the squeezing. He won't take his lips off the chapped set in front of him, he won't let Lovino pull back even though it's the Italian pulling him in and pressing back so hard like he thinks one of them is going to slip away.

A warm hand on Gilbert's shoulder from somewhere else is a signal he somehow understands, and the kiss breaks so he can tuck his forehead down and press his face against the side of Lovino's neck. He has his arms wrapped around his shoulders, his lover not letting go around his torso as he mimics the gesture, panting heavily and swallowing sobs while they just breathe each other in. Gilbert opens his eyes briefly to see confetti dropping from the ceiling between the studio lights, but he's more interested in turning his lips against the hot skin next to him and kissing away a bit more of that paralyzing stress. He smells like sweat and old aftershave, but he's shaking in Gilbert's arms and it's not even all from crying: he's leaning on him so hard it's like he's going to lose his balance and fall.

"Vino?"

"_I love you._" Okay good, but- "I'm sorry I didn't tell everyone from the start, I just-"

"You got them to spell my name right." Their arms re-adjust and Gilbert can hear voices again, see people laughing and talking through the plastic rain shimmering down on them still. Lovino won't pick his head up off Gilbert's shoulder, but people keep coming up and smacking him on the back and shoulder in congratulations? That guy with the garlic press is standing a little ways off, waiting impatiently with several of his cohorts, and Gilbert's confused and tries to pull his boyfriend off him a little bit. Nonna Vargas is hovering next to them, bouncing on her toes and utterly thrilled with something: Gilbert's out of the loop.

"My champion! My grandbaby!" As much as Lovino doesn't want to let go of him, Nonna Vargas cannot be ignored and is quick to drag her grandson into a heavy hug, laughing in Italian and wiping a few tears from her eyes as things start clicking. Bonnefoy is shaking hands with other contestants while balancing his daughter on his arm, not producers and contract-holders. There's one camera following the Frenchman with his reunited family as they revel in the celebration, but there are four pointed at Lovino.

"Wait, did you _win?_" Lovino is shaking Grandpa Vargas' hand when Gilbert asks the question, and all three family members give him a look.

"No, I came in last place." That dull tone Lovino uses- "What, you couldn't be bothered to watch what happened?" Both dark brows come down over his puffy eyes, and Lovino's lips thin out the way they do when he's annoyed.

"I was busy getting my ass down here to see you!" He won? He didn't lose? "You should've said something!" Holy shit he _won!_

"You should have been paying attention!" And he's still a demanding little prick!

"Who the hell apologizes for winning! You scared the shit out of-"

"_Don't_ swear in front of my Nonna!" Lovino gets right up in his face, and Gilbert doesn't know if he's starting to smile because he's happy or grinning because he wants to shut Lovino up.

"Don't change the subject: you won!" Probably both.

"Says the last guy to know!"

"At least I wasn't crying!"

"I was scared!" Of winning? Because he won! "Of you, you moron!" Why? "Just shut up!"

Before Gilbert can get another word in, Lovino's got his hands on him again and puts his whole body into unbalancing the blonde until he's dipped back for a kiss, one arm around his waist and the other cradling his head. As good and loving as that feels it's still _embarrassing_ as fuck, and when Gilbert fights back he finds himself accidentally dropped flat on the floor with Lovino swearing and kneeling to ask if he's okay.

He sits up laughing and drags his boyfriend into his lap, because the cameras aren't turning away and Gilbert Beilschmidt doesn't mind showing America just how much he loves his man as he grabs his face again and pulls him in.

Sixteen weeks.

They've done it.

* * *

**Epilogue tomorrow :3**


	9. A Word From Our Sponsors

**Who Knows**

**Heee~ It's done! Thanks for reading, everyone, especially those of you who've commented along the way, I really appreciate the time and effort it takes to give even a little squeal of feedback!**

**Epilogue gogogo!**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

A Word From Our Sponsors

Five thousand dollars in professional cookware.

"_I love this pan. This is my favourite pan. It is the best pan." _

"_I think you need to come to bed now."_

Seven-and-a-half thousand in cash for one magazine interview and assorted bonus cash prizes.

"_This is my favourite one, I clipped it out of the magazine."_

"_MY NOSE, GIL, WHAT THE FUCK."_

Three endorsement commercials for another cool fifty grand each, but only after he ditches that god-awful king title they were trying to put on him.

"_They can't make me do this."_

"_Uh, yeah they kinda can."_

Several visits back to Sadik the Photographer's studio, much to Gilbert's displeasure.

"_Taking off my pants is not the worst thing he's ever asked for."_

"_I really didn't need to know that."_

A fuck-you from the Empress Hotel over not enough money to go to court for from his broken contract.

"_I want to punch that stupid Austrian in his stupid Austrian face!"_

"_Gil, no."_

"_I'll make it look like an accident I swear!"_

A cook-book deal that takes three months to hit shelves but doesn't actually take as much time or effort as he'd thought. It's just in time for Christmas and racks up more money than he thinks it's worth, but another fifteen thousand goes in the bank.

"_Wait, since when have you dressed my grandpa's soup with vinegar…?"_

_"Since that time_ _you thanked me by getting on your knees under the dinner table."_

A month long nation-wide tour, which coincides with the book release and-

"_NO!"_

"_NO YOU CAN'T TAKE HIM AWAY AGAIN." –_Oh shut up.

One hundred and fifty thousand dollars in cash. Taxable.

"_Downtown? Think of the foot traffic."_

"_It's quiet down by the water though, the atmosphere is nice."_

And one civil union certificate, which costs about forty dollars out of pocket, plus a few hundred dollars for matching gold wedding bands. Lovino doesn't cash the first cheque until he knows half of everything he owns belongs to Gilbert.

* * *

Explosions! Hurricanes! Lightning! Fire!

Loud music! Louder music! Guitar riffs and cymbals and synthesizers for everyone!

It's that time of year again! Sixteen weeks, thirty competitors, and our fabulous host!

More love! More drama! More reunions! Just draw a circle and that's the earth, because these are _THE CHEF GAMES!_

Not to be confused with remarkably similar programming on another network, which is obviously not owned by the same parent network, despite the shared theme music and that's clearly not the very familiar Chef Bonnefoy sitting as the head judge here _hmm…_

Average Joe might not be that dumb, so they quickly queue up a heartfelt video with a strumming mandolin and shots of the Windy City to distract the unwary viewer:

White light refracts off the river that runs through the city of Chicago, pulling back to reveal a spring-or-summer scene with cyclists and young, attractive-looking people, plus the occasional hum-drum not-an-actor seen intruding on the scene in the background. The camera uses a large office building as a landmark and changes locations so viewers can rightly assume that the building they settle near is practically on the water with its open patio and wide windows. A red sign that says "_Gil's_" announces the name of the restaurant.

A blonde, shrieking toddler in bitty army pants and a pink tutu and shirt comes squealing across the screen before she's grabbed by a pair of tanned hands and hoisted up into a laughing man's arms. New viewers will wrongly assume that this is the gentleman's daughter, return viewers immediately recognize last year's _Game of Co-_ I mean _The Chef Games' _winner and his niece. D'awws are heard from coast to coast. Cue voice-over with a familiar Italian-Illinois accent:

"_It's been a year and I think the only thing I have to say is I'm happy. Like, I mean I was happy before, but now it's just so much better."_ The camera travels inside and the atmosphere is so comfortable. The rare few who have travelled overseas to central and southern Europe will be torn between calling the raw wood floors and furniture, forest coloured accents, white stucco walls, and red brick-arches Italian or German. It feels like an eclectic blend of a southern cantina and an east-German beer hall: lots of seating, big tables, a place where food is shared and there are only one or two small tables near the back for private meals.

One happy All-American patron explains that here everyone eats at the same table, even if they aren't the same group, he goes on to say:

"_This place is the best of Italy served the German way for an American family. You come in alone and you leave with three friends."_

But enough of him, back to that silly accent. The same man who was holding the toddler transforms into a professional wearing a black and green chef's uniform, sans the stupid hat, with a little yellow bird sewn on the left breast. He's working in a stainless steel kitchen checking order slips and shuffling between a cutting board and a large stone oven. A slightly shorter man with an even darker complexion and a middle-eastern headdress over his hair is watching whatever's in the oven cook, spinning it using the large paddle in his hands, and simply nods before giving a one-word answer and pulling a steaming stone platter out for inspection.

"_After the competition and the tours they dragged me on, my partner took some time off work and we vacationed in Southern France." _A few pictures flash by, and those who are shocked to see two men reclining in the sun with dark glasses, shorts and shirts calmly brush it off after a few moments. Most of the images are sun-drenched back-drops and little more than touching hands or arms around shoulders and waists to say they're more than just close friends. There's nothing to suggest a honeymoon, but several disappointed groans still tease female throats. The hot ones are always gay… or married. "_We blitzed across Italy looking for a winery for the restaurant. We found something small in Lazio province in the middle of the peninsula, and to be honest I like it better than most of the bigger labels we saw."_

They blur out the label, the show's California winery will throw a fit if they don't.

"_Figure out early why you're in this."_ Enough pictures and clips, the man himself is sitting at one of his tables near the bar, a wine-glass with that infamous red sitting next to him. It's so strange to see him smiling. "_That's my best advice. Figure out why, decide on a goal, and don't let anything else get in your way. So-_"

Damn that baby.

The same elated squealing from before, followed by a rushed Italian voice behind it interrupts the footage. Without even a twitch, the man slides off his seat and bends out of the frame, reappearing with a blue-eyed, chubby-cheeked little monster who has added a cowboy hat to her colourful ensemble. Her uncle pulls the babe close and gives her a kiss, which she doesn't notice because those soulful blue eyes are staring straight through the lens and into America's living room: why would they cut that? The conversation that follows slightly off-camera stays for the same reason, with subtitles added.

"_Sorry, Lovi. Here, I'll take her."_

"_It's fine, she can stay."_

"_But you're doing your interview."_

"_So what? Hands off, little brother: go get your own."_

"_But she __**is**__ mine!"_

Why the heck won't this guy sign a contract for his own show? Jesus _Christ _they could make a killing…

So the restaurant is doing well? They're just over half-way through their time.

"_I'd say doing 'well' as an understatement. We're booked full most nights."_ And the style was all his then? His dream restaurant? "_Any restaurant is someone's dream, but did you see the name outside? Gil built this place, I'm the one who feeds the guests." _Guests, as opposed to customers? The in-joke sinks in comfortably.

The camera gets a dirty look, which is made far less threatening by the toddler whose tiny fingers are merrily grabbing at the man's scowling chin and cheeks. She ends up giving him a smack that makes him laugh because it's cute and doesn't hurt, and a pair of tiny arms locking around his neck so she can stand and look around the restaurant banishes what remains of the sour look.

"_No one sits down at my table and leaves hungry, no one gets bad service, and no one leaves embarrassed or upset. When you eat in my home then I don't care if I have to personally ladle you a bowl of Gilbert's grey potato slop and have my Nonna come spoon-feed you, you are going to eat and you are going to like it."_

And as if that ridiculous image isn't enough, this is when the camera breaks and shows a slowly growing wall of photos. Each framed image is in a different seat at the restaurant, but comes complete with a tiny old Italian Grandmother with a headscarf holding a spoonful of food out to a patron. Occasionally a child shows up somewhere, but usually it's a flustered adult whose image is snapped right as they're breaking into a bashful grin. But one picture looks a little odd…

"_Nonna was playing bridge that night, that's Gil with an apron on his head." _Oh. Yes, of course. That makes perfect sense. Crazy Italians…

The last fifteen seconds of the video spot are in yet another part of the restaurant, this time with it closed and quiet. The greenery of the park across the street from their window is visible, and the previous champion is sitting next to a tall blonde man, both of them dressed sharp, but informally. It doesn't take a genius to guess who this new person must be: the wedding band on his left hand and how close he's sitting to the brunette give it away long before the brief looks and poorly hidden smiles. The language of the newly-wed doesn't acknowledge gender.

Frustrated groans this time: gay or married, if it's not one or the other then it's both!

"_The contestants' families? I'd say stock up on dirty laundry and don't forget to feed their cat."_

"_You're disgusting. And irresponsible."_

"_Says the guy who bawled his eyes out when he won."_

Elbow to the gut. Okay, maybe they're not quite newly-wed anymore.

"_Say good-bye to the camera, Gil."_ There's a folded piece of paper on the table that the former champion reaches for, his partner grinning and giving a childish wave as the time speeds into the last three seconds. They each take one side of the sheet, which is actually two pages taped together, and they hold it up in front of the lens for America, and Season Thr- I mean One to read:

"_Remember who._

_Remember why._

_And remember not to cut your hand."_

Now back to your regularly scheduled Tuesday night entertainment.

_**Fin**_


	10. Shhh

**Shhh, no this is not a chapter.**

**Just a 3-page bonus that I wrote for Miq, who helped get the ball rolling for the AU. We did some RPing and she drew me a picture, and then I wrote a drabble illustrating the picture.**

**Everyone needs a few more Prumano cuddles in their life.**

* * *

_**Game of Cooks**_

(Secret Bonus, shhh!)

Feliciano is waiting at the airport to pick all four of them up: Nonna, Nonno, Gilbert, and Lovino. He takes them straight to his house where Monica, the baby, and a full meal for the tired travellers is waiting. Lovino gets to hold his niece, kiss her, rock her gently on his shoulder, and lean on the arm Gilbert has comfortably curled around him. There's laughing and a lot of stupid conversation, and although he usually grinds against being the centre of attention, it's fun telling his family about all the stupid little quirks and things that went on in the crazy house where he was kept for too long.

Eventually the grandparents have to leave, because Nonna is beyond exhausted and Nonno can't drive with the weird jet-lag. Feliciano takes them home and Monica puts Amelia down- not for the whole night, but long enough that she's better off in her crib with the baby monitor turned on. Gilbert and Lovino linger for another hour or so, but finally they're too tired to keep the conversation going and Feliciano grabs his keys one more time to play chauffer.

The elevator is _still_ busted at their apartment, so they have to drag their own luggage up all those stairs to reach the door, and then it's a wild search for keys that Gilbert hasn't needed in a week and Lovino hasn't touched in four months. He wants their apartment, he wants their music collection and their leather couch, their TV, their rug, their shower-head and doorknobs and that window Gilbert likes to drink his coffee in front of every morning. He wants to be _home_, and just stamps his forehead on the wall next to their front door while Gilbert hisses and curses in the dim hallway looking for the cut steel piece that will let them inside.

The apartment smells like dust, but then there's the sting of cat and bird before a little bell and whispering paws announce a certain someone's approach. Lovino almost trips twice over his own cat, the animal swirling around his ankles and moving very quickly from little mews to proper meows, to steadily more irritated yowls and growls and grunts and hisses and _holy shit, cat, give him a minute._

While he tends to the white and brown splotched demon digging its claws into their floors, Gilbert actually turns on a light and hustles around making sure their luggage is all neatly placed inside the actual apartment before shutting the door. The cat was given ample food and water before Gilbert left, it's just pissy and wants attention as Lovino scoops the former stray up into his arms. Gilbird isn't here: he's at their neighbour's and it's way too late to go knocking on doors looking for the canary.

"I'm gonna go take a shower while you sate the demon." Sounds like a plan, but the way Gilbert moves quietly around from behind him and leans in for a kiss makes it seem like more than that. Even with the light on in their living room, the apartment is still dark, and it's still late: Gil practically whispers the words to him, so the kiss lasts longer than it probably has to before his boyfriend drifts away to find a towel and clean clothes.

Lovino sheds his jacket, knocks over one of his suitcases and unzips it, rifling around inside to find a long black sweatshirt that's way too big for him, but the heat was turned off for Gil's week away and he's more worried about comfort than cleanliness. Laundry tomorrow, shower tomorrow, right now he grabs that stupid cat back up off the floor again and sinks down with his legs crossed.

"See? You hate being held, you don't like having your belly rubbed…" But every time he feels those claws come out he sets the cat down, and then the monster just comes right back for more. It's a stupid, ridiculous cycle of purring and hissing, and it lasts until the sound of the water shuts off and the faint smell of steam wafts through the dust and cat of the apartment.

The cat finally settles on just being really pissed with him for leaving for so long and wanders off somewhere, which means Gil's timed his return perfectly as he plops down on the floor next to him. One arm snakes around Lovino's shoulders, but not before he gets the worn-out hood up over his head and hears his partner start chuckling at him. Through the cotton layers he feels Gilbert's nose and mouth nuzzle up against the back of his neck, a deep breath in making his toes curl just a bit inside his shoes.

"So that's where my favourite sweater went." Now that he's aware of his shoes again Lovino starts pulling them off, letting the sneakers hit the floor and giving his feet a reprieve from all the pacing he's been doing. "I thought it looked familiar on TV…"

"There're holes in it everywhere. Which band was it on the front?" The decorations are so old they've completely worn away on the once-black-but-now-grey fabric. The sweater isn't even warm anymore either, drafty with worn out arm-pits and too many holes in the kangaroo pouch to hold anything in it.

"My _favourite_ sweater." Gilbert repeats, and it's not hard for Lovino to twist around on his rump and fall back a little, letting Gil's legs catch him as his hips scoot back across the hard floor. He looks up with what he knows is an exhausted little smile, and Gilbert's got that half-lidded _'I'm so tired I could die'_ expression on his face, but neither one of them suggests going to bed. Not yet.

"It's mine now." Gil's just wearing a black muscle shirt and sweatpants now, his body warm from a hot shower and still smelling like the sharp-scented soaps Lovino hasn't caught a proper whiff of in weeks. He closes his eyes when a heavy hand comes down on his head, Gilbert's thick, warm fingers brushing his hair and pulling the hood away. "I claimed it."

"Is that right?" Mhmm… "Well how about this then."

The words don't really make much sense, but as Gil bends down Lovino reaches up to get a hand or an arm or whatever he can manage around his neck. He uses the strong muscles there to pull himself up a little so the kiss comes half-way, or a couple thirds or something he can't measure right now. His eyes close on their own because it's so warm, but so fucking uncomfortable to kiss like this. The hand on his head turns into an arm hugging around his shoulders, and Lovino has to use both arms to pick himself up and scooch his hips all the way until he's sitting in Gil's lap.

That's much better, and it's not ravishing, passionate face-battles right now either. It's kissing. It's lips to skin and tongues barely flicking one another, mouths almost closed just so the sensations are all focused on lips and breaths. They both taste like airlines and cabin pressure, which isn't so much a taste as an atmosphere, and it sucks, but it can't negate who they are to one another. Lovino threads his fingers through those short white locks of hair at the base of Gilbert's neck, and he can feel his boyfriend getting a firm, familiar grip around the back of his neck with one warm hand.

The kisses turn into traded smooches and touches, noses bumping back and forth intimately before they both just kind of fizzle out. The crook of Gil's neck beckons him and Lovino answers the call, letting his face settle right in the bend and arguing with his eyes about whether or not they should stay open for him. Gil's body sort of slumps back until he's leaning properly on the couch, relaxing as his back caves a little bit and they both know it without saying anything: if they sleep like this, tomorrow will be _pain._

"Bed." Gil grunts.

"Bed." He agrees. "Bed, no sex."

"No sex please." Not tonight, oh god not tonight, they'd either die or just fall asleep on one another and that's just too embarrassing. "Get up."

"No." No, he's warm and comfortable right here.

"Get uuup, sweater-stealer."

"It's _mine_…" he whines back, and slowly makes his legs start moving.

"You're mine," is Gilbert's answer, before Lovino picks his sleepy head up for one more good-night kiss…

* * *

**Shhhh...! *scampers off***


End file.
